Unwanted loneliness in older people is one of the main problems in today’s society. In Spain alone, 64% of individuals who are in this population range experience, to a greater or lesser extent, a feeling of unwanted loneliness. And it should be noted that this is considered serious or very serious in 14.8% of cases. This represents a risk factor for the health of older people, especially from a mental and emotional point of view. Therefore, it is not surprising that numerous studies are carried out in this regard. Fortunately, one of them sheds some optimism into this situation.
This is the research entitled “The strength of the weakest ties: a little explored resource to maintain emotional well-being in old age”, developed by specialists from the universities of Berlin, New York and Michigan, and published in the magazine “The Journals of Gerontology.” It talks about the so-called weak ties or ties, as well as the impact they have on the lives of people in a situation of unwanted loneliness. And how they influence their mental and emotional health in a positive way.
When thinking about the relationships and social interactions that are part of a person’s life, friends or family usually come to mind. That is, those strong ties that have a quality of permanence over time and imply a high degree of trust. However, this study focuses on weak ties, which are those links that are established with all the people who are in an individual’s closest environment. It is not a deep union, it is temporary in nature and is not usually characterized by trust. But they are the ones that, according to this research, could be key to minimizing unwanted loneliness in older people.
The results obtained from this research reveal that, when there is a greater number of weaker ties, this was associated with having more close ties over time. Furthermore, the number of weak ties more strongly predicted positive age-related changes than did strong ties. Therefore, weaker ties offer older people a more effective way to promote their emotional well-being over time. It was even observed in this study that they represented an additional benefit, since they were capable of compensating for the losses that occurred in terms of the number of strong ties.
