IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jijerp/v19y2022i9p5575-d808291.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Does Mobile Internet Use Affect the Loneliness of Older Chinese Adults? An Instrumental Variable Quantile Analysis

Author

Listed:
  • Zenghua Guo

    (School of Marxism, Hubei University of Economics, Wuhan 430205, China)

  • Boyu Zhu

    (School of Sociology, Wuhan University, Wuhan 430072, China)

Abstract

Based on the 2018 China Family Panel Studies (CFPS) data, we empirically analyze the effect, heterogeneity, quantile differences and influencing mechanisms of mobile Internet use on loneliness in the elderly. The study found that the loneliness of the elderly who used mobile Internet was 33.1% lower than that of the elderly who did not use the mobile Internet The study also passed the robustness test. There is heterogeneity in the effect of mobile Internet use on loneliness among the elderly of different ages, educational levels and marital status. Among them, the use of mobile Internet has a significant alleviating effect on the loneliness of the 60–70-year-old elderly, those of junior high school education level and below, and the elderly with a partner. The quantile regression analysis showed that the elderly group with a high level of loneliness benefited more from the use of mobile Internet. Mediation analysis further showed that mobile Internet use can improve parent–child relationship, increase offline interactions with children, and reduce children’s tangible support, which we interpret as a potential mechanism for mobile Internet use to alleviate loneliness in the elderly.

Suggested Citation

  • Zenghua Guo & Boyu Zhu, 2022. "Does Mobile Internet Use Affect the Loneliness of Older Chinese Adults? An Instrumental Variable Quantile Analysis," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(9), pages 1-18, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:19:y:2022:i:9:p:5575-:d:808291
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/19/9/5575/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/19/9/5575/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Shuo Shi & Lu Zhang & Guohua Wang, 2023. "Bridging the Digital Divide: Internet Use of Older People from the Perspective of Peer Effects," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(15), pages 1-16, August.
    2. Zhang, Huaquan & Yang, Fan & Chandio, Abbas Ali & Liu, Jing & Twumasi, Martinson Ankrah & Ozturk, Ilhan, 2023. "Assessing the effects of internet technology use on rural households' cooking energy consumption: Evidence from China," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 284(C).
    3. Adeleke, Richard & Iyanda, Ayodeji Emmanuel & Chris-Emenyonu, Chinonso, 2024. "Analyzing the relationship between the experience of intimate partner violence and female internet use in Nigeria," Telecommunications Policy, Elsevier, vol. 48(4).
    4. Qunlin Zhang & Zhibin Li, 2022. "The Impact of Internet Use on the Social Networks of the Elderly in China—The Mediating Effect of Social Participation," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(15), pages 1-17, August.
    5. Chengmin Zhou & Fangfang Yuan & Ting Huang & Yurong Zhang & Jake Kaner, 2022. "The Impact of Interface Design Element Features on Task Performance in Older Adults: Evidence from Eye-Tracking and EEG Signals," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(15), pages 1-24, July.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:19:y:2022:i:9:p:5575-:d:808291. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.