Table 1.
Descriptive Statistics
| Wives (N = 953) | Husbands (N = 953) | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mean/% | % Missing | Mean/% | % Missing | |
| Social relationships (range: 0–4) | ||||
| Marital support* | 3.5 | 0.3 | 3.6 | 0.4 |
| Marital strain* | 0.8 | 0.4 | 1.0 | 0.5 |
| Family support* | 3.1 | 0.2 | 2.5 | 0.5 |
| Family strain* | 0.6 | 2.1 | 0.4 | 2.1 |
| Friend support* | 2.5 | 0.7 | 2.0 | 0.6 |
| Friend strain | 0.1 | 3.8 | 0.2 | 4.5 |
| Social participation (range: 0–6) | ||||
| Volunteering* | 2.4 | 12.1 | 2.0 | 11.3 |
| Attending meetings of organized groups* | 2.8 | 11.9 | 2.4 | 11.6 |
| Attending religious services* | 3.4 | 0.2 | 3.0 | 0.2 |
| Socializing with friends or relatives | 4.4 | 11.9 | 4.2 | 11.1 |
| Functional status (%) | 0.0 | 0.0 | ||
| No limitation | 64.7 | 71.2 | ||
| Any IADL, but no ADL | 20.8 | 16.5 | ||
| Any ADL | 14.5 | 12.3 | ||
| Cognitive status (%)* | 0.0 | 0.0 | ||
| No impairment | 73.0 | 59.8 | ||
| Mild cognitive impairment | 19.2 | 28.8 | ||
| Dementia | 7.8 | 11.4 | ||
| Sociodemographic characteristics | ||||
| Age (range: 36–99)* | 67.6 | 0.0 | 71.1 | 0.0 |
| Education (%)* | 0.0 | 0.0 | ||
| Less than high school | 10.8 | 14.8 | ||
| High school diploma or equivalent | 24.9 | 23.6 | ||
| Some college/associate degree/vocational certificate | 39.6 | 26.4 | ||
| Bachelor’s degree and above | 24.6 | 35.2 | ||
| Race (%) | 0.4 | 0.2 | ||
| White | 87.9 | 87.9 | ||
| Black | 6.4 | 6.4 | ||
| Other | 5.7 | 5.7 | ||
| Hispanic | 7.4 | 0.2 | 7.4 | 0.2 |
| Depressive symptoms (CES-D score 0–30)* | 5.16 | 0.0 | 4.15 | 0.0 |
Note: ADL = activity of daily living; IADL = instrumental activity of daily living; CES-D = Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale.
*Significant gender difference at p <.05 based on t tests for continuous variables and chi-squared tests for categorical variables.