Relocation for a better life? A longitudinal study of informal social participation and life satisfaction of older adults relocated for poverty alleviation in China.
Informal social participation enhances life satisfaction among relocated older adults not by improving sleep duration, but primarily through reducing perceived stress, such that social participation lowers stress levels which in turn leads to greater long-term life satisfaction.
Key Findings
Results
Informal social participation at T1 predicted perceived stress levels 6 months later (T2) among older adults relocated for poverty alleviation.
The study used four longitudinal cross-lagged models tested with AMOS Statistics 26
The sample included 1345 participants with a mean age of 71.52 years (SD: 7.19), 48.4% female
Participants were surveyed using the Perceived Stress Scale-14 (PSS-14)
The relationship was assessed across three time points with 6-month intervals between measurements
Results
Informal social participation at T1 predicted sleep duration 6 months later (T2).
Cross-lagged longitudinal modeling with AMOS Statistics 26 was used to test this relationship
Sleep duration was assessed as a potential mediator between social participation and life satisfaction
The effect of social participation on sleep duration did not translate into a significant indirect effect on life satisfaction at T3
Results
Perceived stress at T2 predicted life satisfaction 6 months later (T3).
Life satisfaction was measured using the Satisfaction with Life Scale (SWLS)
Bootstrap methods were employed to test mediation pathways
This finding established perceived stress as a significant longitudinal predictor of life satisfaction among relocated older adults
Results
Informal social participation at T1 predicted life satisfaction at T3 through perceived stress at T2 as a mediator.
This indirect pathway was confirmed using bootstrap mediation methods
The mediation indicates a sequential longitudinal pathway: social participation → reduced stress → increased life satisfaction
The mediation effect spanned approximately 12 months from T1 to T3
Common method bias (CMB) was tested using AMOS Statistics 26 and was not found to be a severe problem
Results
Informal social participation at T1 did not predict life satisfaction at T3 through sleep duration at T2.
Despite social participation predicting sleep duration at T2, sleep duration did not function as a significant mediator to life satisfaction at T3
This finding distinguishes the stress-reduction pathway as the primary mechanism linking social participation to well-being
The null mediation through sleep duration contrasts with the significant mediation through perceived stress
Results
The study found no severe problem of common method bias (CMB) in the dataset.
CMB was tested using AMOS Statistics 26
The longitudinal design with multiple time points helps mitigate common method bias concerns
This supports the validity of the self-reported measures including the PSS-14 and SWLS
What This Means
This research followed 1,345 older adults in China who had been relocated from their homes as part of government poverty alleviation programs, surveying them three times over roughly one year. The study investigated how participating in informal social activities — such as community gatherings or casual group interactions — related to their overall satisfaction with life, and whether stress levels or sleep quality explained this relationship. The participants had an average age of about 71 years, and nearly half were women.
The researchers found that older adults who engaged more in informal social activities reported lower stress levels six months later, and those lower stress levels were associated with higher life satisfaction six months after that. This means social participation helped people feel more satisfied with life primarily by reducing how stressed they felt, not by improving how long they slept. While social participation did appear to influence sleep duration, better sleep did not translate into meaningfully higher life satisfaction in this group.
This research suggests that for older adults who have been uprooted from their communities through relocation programs, maintaining or building informal social connections is important for psychological well-being — and the main reason appears to be stress relief rather than improved sleep. The findings point to stress reduction as a key target for community administrators and policymakers designing programs to support the well-being of relocated older adults, suggesting that fostering social opportunities in new communities may be a practical way to help this vulnerable population adjust and thrive.
Yang L, Yao D, Nakagomi A. (2026). Relocation for a better life? A longitudinal study of informal social participation and life satisfaction of older adults relocated for poverty alleviation in China.. BMC psychology. https://doi.org/10.1186/s40359-026-04066-8