The purpose of this study is to explore the current state of social networks and the current participation in social activities of the elderly, and to clarify the relationship between social factors and self-rated health in the urban-suburban context. The study subjects were independently living elderly people who live in two areas, urban and suburban area, and the self-reported survey data was collected through mailed questionnaire. The measure of social activities was constructed from three aspects: personal activities, socially-related activities, and learning activities.
The suburban area indicated stronger social networks and a lower frequency of going outdoors than the urban area. In the case of social activities of the elderly, aspect of personal activities indicated highest score than aspects of socially-related activities or learning activities. The most common activity was hobby activity among socially-related activities, going shopping among personal activities and participation in community workshop among learning activities. It was different properties between two areas depending on contents of social activity. The suburban elderly as compared to the rural elderly were significantly more likely to have relationship with neighbors. The rural elderly were significantly more participation in community workshop than suburban elderly. Partial rank correlation coefficients between social activities and social network or frequency of going outdoors were relatively high. Self-rated health was positively associated with frequency of going outdoors and personal activities.
Although trend in degrees of frequency of going outdoors or social network were different in the suburbs and the urban area, there was interrelated with social activities.
To promote social activity in the community, it might be effective to use social network or place to go out frequently by providing information in activities. Our results were also suggested that the boost of outdoor activity, especially personal activities might be beneficial to self-rated health in the community-dwelling elderly.
