Friendships that money can buy: financial security protects health in retirement by enabling social connectedness

Table 1 Sample Demographics

	Cross-sectional sample of retirees (N = 3109) ^a		Longitudinal sample transitioning to retirement (N = 404) ^b
Gender	56.0% female		50.5% female
Age	M = 70.70 (SD = 9.68),		M = 65.74 (SD = 8.35)
Age	Range 45–98		Range 45–94
Education	Less than Year 12	46.9%	Less than Year 12	33.9%
	Year 12	8.4%	Year 12	7.4%
	Certificate or Diploma	30.6%	Certificate or Diploma	38.1%
	University	14.0%	University	20.3%
Subjective financial security	Very poor	0.9%	Very poor	2.2%
	Poor	3.2%	Poor	3.2%
	Just getting along	24.3%	Just getting along	27.2%
	Reasonably comfortable	56.6%	Reasonably comfortable	53.7%
	Very comfortable	13.8%	Very comfortable	12.6%
	Prosperous	1.2%	Prosperous	1.0%
Household income band	M = 6.47 (SD = 2.55)		M = 6.93 (SD = 2.82)
Household income band	Range: 1–13		Range: 1–13
Social connectedness	M = 5.36 (SD = 1.08)		M = 5.39 (SD = 1.07)
Social connectedness	Range: 1–7		Range: 2.20–7
Mental health	M = 73.83 (SD = 18.52)		M = 75.02 (SD = 17.20)
Mental health	Range: 0–100		Range: 8–100
Physical health	Poor	9.8%	Poor	7.7%
	Fair	28.4%	Fair	26.0%
	Good	38.5%	Good	34.7%
	Very good	19.7%	Very good	25.2%
	Excellent	3.6%	Excellent	4.7%

^aCross-sectional sample is weighted to increase its representativeness of the Australian population. Approximately 11% of the cross-sectional sample was also included in the longitudinal sample. Cross-sectional analyses were repeated with these respondents excluded and the results were not affected. Therefore, the overlapping respondents were retained in order to preserve population-representativeness.
^bDescriptive statistics for the longitudinal sample are reported for respondents at the post-retirement transition time point.

ISSN: 1471-2318