Trajectories of depression across key events in later life: findings from the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Various key events characterise experiences in later life, such as retirement, bereavement, caregiving, developing long-term conditions and hospital admission. Given their potential to disrupt lives, such events may affect older people's mental health, but research on the associations between such events and depression has produced inconsistent findings.

Aims

To investigate the impact of key events in later life on depression trajectories in a representative cohort of people aged 50-69 in England.

Method

Our sample draws on 6890 respondents aged 50-69 in Wave 1 (2002/2003) of the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing, following them through to Wave 9 (2018/2019). We measured depression using the eight-item Center for Epidemiological Studies Depression scale.

SUBMITTER: Beach B 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12614320 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature