Social isolation and loneliness are serious yet underappreciated public health risks that affect a significant portion of the older adult population. Approximately one-quarter of community-dwelling Americans aged 65 and older are considered to be socially isolated, and a significant proportion of adults in the United States report feeling lonely. People who are 50 years of age or older are more likely to experience many of the risk factors that can cause or exacerbate social isolation or loneliness, such as living alone, the loss of family or friends, chronic illness, and sensory impairments. Over a life course, social isolation and loneliness may be episodic or chronic, depending upon an individual's circumstances and perceptions. A substantial body of evidence demonstrates that social isolation presents a major risk for premature mortality, comparable to other risk factors such as high blood pressure, smoking, or obesity. As older adults are particularly high-volume and high-frequency users of the health care system, there is an opportunity for health care professionals to identify, prevent, and mitigate the adverse health impacts of social isolation and loneliness in older adults. Social Isolation and Loneliness in Older Adults summarizes the evidence base and explores how social isolation and loneliness affect health and quality of life in adults aged 50 and older, particularly among low income, underserved, and vulnerable populations. This report makes recommendations specifically for clinical settings of health care to identify those who suffer the resultant negative health impacts of social isolation and loneliness and target interventions to improve their social conditions. Social Isolation and Loneliness in Older Adults considers clinical tools and methodologies, better education and training for the health care workforce, and dissemination and implementation that will be important for translating research into practice, especially as the evidence base for effective interventions continues to flourish.

This volume contains contributions from 24 internationally known scholars covering a broad spectrum of interests in cross-cultural theory and research. This breadth is reflected in the diversity of the topics covered in the volume, which include theoretical approaches to cross-cultural research, the dimensions of national cultures and their measurement, ecological and economic foundations of culture, cognitive, perceptual and emotional manifestations of culture, and bicultural and intercultural processes. In addition to the individual chapters, the volume contains a dialog among 14 experts in the field on a number of issues of concern in cross-cultural research, including the relation of psychological studies of culture to national development and national policies, the relationship between macro structures of a society and shared cognitions, the integration of structural and process models into a coherent theory of culture, how personal experiences and cultural traditions give rise to intra-cultural variation, whether culture can be validly measured by self-reports, the new challenges that confront cultural psychology, and whether psychology should strive to eliminate culture as an explanatory variable.

This book provides an interdisciplinary analysis of the correlates and consequences of residential relocation. Drawing on multiple nationally representative data sets, the book explores historic patterns and current trends in household mobility; individuals’ mobility-related decisions; and the individual, family, and community outcomes associated with moving. These sections inform later discussions of mobility-related policy, practice, and directions for future research.

This book offers an in-depth exploration of the burgeoning field of meaning in life in the psychological sciences, covering conceptual and methodological issues, core psychological mechanisms, environmental, cognitive and personality variables and more.

Following on from the ground-breaking first edition, which received the 2014 EDRA Achievement Award, this fully updated text includes new chapters on current issues in the built environment, such as GIS and mapping, climate change, and qualitative approaches. Place attachments are powerful emotional bonds that form between people and their physical surroundings. They inform our sense of identity, create meaning in our lives, facilitate community, and influence action. Place attachments have bearing on such diverse issues as rootedness and belonging, placemaking and displacement, mobility and migration, intergroup conflict, civic engagement, social housing and urban redevelopment, natural resource management, and global climate change. In this multidisciplinary book, Manzo and Devine-Wright draw together the latest thinking by leading scholars from around the globe, including contributions from scholars such as Daniel Williams, Mindy Fullilove, Randy Hester, and David Seamon, to capture significant advancements in three main areas: theory, methods, and applications. Over the course of fifteen chapters, using a wide range of conceptual and applied methods, the authors critically review and challenge contemporary knowledge, identify significant advances, and point to areas for future research. This important volume offers the most current understandings about place attachment, a critical concept for the environmental social sciences and placemaking professions.

The book is comprised of empirical analyses of the relationships people have during their lives and how these affect their individual welfare. These include relationships between members of a couple, between parents and children, between the children themselves and between non-related individuals.