| With the intensification of the aging phenomenon,the health problems of the aging population in China cannot be ignored in the economic and social development.The World Health Organization(WHO)proposes that "health includes not only physical health,but also mental health,moral health and good social adaptability",among which mental health is directly related to individual physical health,family relationship atmosphere,social resource allocation and national harmony and stability.In order to promote the strategy of Healthy China and the strategy of actively coping with the aging of the population,and to improve the health of the elderly,the country has proposed the "14th Five-Year Plan" for healthy aging.The planning clearly indicates that the task of supporting home care services is essential.Accordingly,based on questionnaire data from the China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study(CHARLS),this paper explored the baseline effect of intergenerational support on the mental health status of middle-aged and older adults in China using an ordered logit regression model with family intergenerational support as the entry point.The effect was also analyzed for group heterogeneity and the indirect impact pathways of the three mediating variables were examined.The study concluded that(1)comprehensive intergenerational support had a positive effect on the mental health status of middle-aged and older adults in China.There were significant positive effects of two-way economic material support,offspring life care support and spiritual emotional support(communication contact),non-significant negative effects of parental life care support and non-significant positive effects of spiritual emotional support(visitation).This suggests that the pathway in which intergenerational support directly affects mental health is mainly achieved through the effects of two-way economic and material support,offspring life care support,and communication link support.(2)The subgroup regression results showed that the effect of combined intergenerational support was not heterogeneous in terms of gender and age,but was significantly heterogeneous in terms of area of residence,spousal status,education level,and presence of chronic diseases.(3)In testing the indirect effect of comprehensive intergenerational support on mental health,we found that "life satisfaction","satisfaction with physical health",and "satisfaction of relationship with children" all had significant mediating effects,with the contribution rates of 49.78%,34.10% and 23.68%,respectively.The indirect mediating effect of "life satisfaction" is the most significant.To conclude,based on the findings of the study,this paper proposes countermeasures and suggestions to improve the overall mental health of middle-aged and elderly people: strengthen the family aging function,increase the intensity of intergenerational support,improve the living conditions of rural middle-aged and elderly people,call for remarriage of middle-aged and elderly people,and popularize and promote health knowledge. |
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