Table 1.
Study characteristics of the longitudinal analytic sample
| Study dataa | ||
|---|---|---|
| Longitudinal measures | Mean | n |
| Number of depressive symptoms during the past week (0–8) | ||
| Wave 1 (2002/2003) | 1.6 | 11,037 |
| Wave 2 (2004/2005) | 1.6 | 8519 |
| Wave 3 (2006/2007) | 1.5 | 7248 |
| Wave 4 (2008/2009) | 1.4 | 6300 |
| Wave 5 (2010/2011) | 1.5 | 5843 |
| Wave 6 (2012/2013) | 1.3 | 5291 |
| Wave 7 (2014/2015) | 1.4 | 4571 |
| Baseline measures | Mean or % | n |
|---|---|---|
| Perceived social cohesion score (0–24) | ||
| High (22–24) | 35.3 | 3896 |
| Medium (18–21) | 32.5 | 3587 |
| Low (0–17) | 32.2 | 3554 |
| Baseline age | 65.2 | 11,037 |
| Female | 53.7 | 5927 |
| Non-white | 2.7 | 298 |
| Self-reported ever doctor-diagnosis of depression | 5.4 | 596 |
| No educational qualification | 43.1 | 4757 |
| Economic activity | ||
| Employed | 33.1 | 3653 |
| Retired | 49.9 | 5507 |
| Economically inactive | 7.4 | 817 |
| Permanently sick/disabled | 9.6 | 1060 |
| Total non-pension wealth | ||
| 1 (wealthiest) | 19.7 | 2174 |
| 2 | 19.8 | 2185 |
| 3 | 20.1 | 2218 |
| 4 | 20.2 | 2230 |
| 5 | 20.2 | 2230 |
| Self-rated health | ||
| Very good | 20.0 | 2207 |
| Good | 33.9 | 3742 |
| Fair | 27.6 | 3046 |
| Poor | 18.5 | 2042 |
| Self-reported limiting long-term illness | 34.3 | 3786 |
aThe estimates are averaged over the multiply imputed data sets, and corrected for the study’s non-response at wave 1. The longitudinal analytic sample (n = 11,037) includes participants with varying observations of valid data on depressive symptoms across waves