Supplementary grandchild care, social integration, and depressive symptoms: longitudinal findings from Korea

Abstract

Objectives

Despite growing concerns about the heavy reliance on supplementary grandchild care in Korea, understanding of its longitudinal effects on the grandparents’ mental health has been limited. This study examined whether transition patterns of grandchild care among Korean grandparents were associated with changes in the grandparents’ depressive symptoms, directly or indirectly, through changes in two domains of social integration (intergenerational contact and social activities) after controlling for socioeconomic characteristics and baseline levels of depressive symptoms and social integration.

Method

Using the Korean Longitudinal Study of Aging (N = 4,362), a nationally representative multiwave survey, we examined four possible statuses of grandchild care over a three-year period: started (n = 64), continuous (n = 73), and discontinued (n = 103) caregiving, and non-caregiving (n = 4,121). The proposed mediation model was analyzed using structural equation modeling with non-caregivers as a reference group, and Wald tests were conducted to further examine differences in the effects across the three caregiving groups.

Results

The direct effects of grandchild care on depressive symptoms in Korean grandparents were not significant. Rather, those who started or continuously provided caregiving had significantly reduced depressive symptoms via increased intergenerational contact compared to the non-caregiving group.

Conclusion

These findings indicated beneficial effects of grandchild care on depressive symptoms in Korean grandparents through increased social integration within the family. Implications of the study findings were discussed.

Keywords:

• Grandchild care in Korea
• depressive symptoms
• social integration
• intergenerational contact
• social activities

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1 Among respondents who were older than 80 years old, very few were providing grandchild care at W3. Similarly, very few respondents reported providing grandchild care in the follow up assessments (W5-6).

2 Because the baseline measures for depressive symptoms and social integration should cover the time periods before the grandchild caregiving experiences assessed between W3 and W4, we used depressive symptoms assessed at W1 and social integration assessed at W2 (because it was not assessed at W1).