Social Support and Wellbeing Among Older Australians

The authors examine the relationship between social support and subjective wellbeing using data from the Household Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia (HILDA) Survey. The chapter focuses on measures of social support that reflect the perception of support a person receives from friends and family. The results suggest that social support enhances wellbeing among older people. This finding is robust to alternative ways of measuring wellbeing including the Mental Health Inventory (MHI-5) scale, life satisfaction, depression and Kessler Psychological Distress (K10) scale.