Social Science Designed Meaningful Friendships Service

社会科学设计有意义的友谊服务

• 批准号: 10018709
• 金额: $ 19.1万
• 依托单位: BUDDYHUB C.I.C.
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Small Business Research Initiative
• 财政年份: 2022
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2022 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=10018709
• 关键词: Social; Science; Designed; Meaningful; Friendships

BuddyHub's 'Friendship Wheel' service is tackling the loneliness epidemic amongst older people. We surround a lonely older person with an intergenerational, supportive social group of 4, to help them rebuild their social circle.This project will design and pilot a parallel service to form groups or 'Clubs' of 10-15 people around diverse interests. This will help older people further increase their personal network with members of all ages benefiting from local intergenerational friendships.The challenge the project solves is groups of 4 require a significant commitment from supporters and larger groups may have more longer-term resilience.The number of friends you have is a key predictor of your mental and physical health. Having friends to socialise with and for support, protects against disease and cognitive decline.The flipside is loneliness: 2.6m UK adults always or often feel lonely and 1.5m chronically lonely people are 65+. The cost to the NHS alone of today's chronically lonely 65+ people is £1bn per year.Evidence suggests a maximum personal network size of 150 people arranged in layers of 5, 15, 50, 150\. Emotional closeness lessens with each layer. Adults mostly socialise with the first 15, our 'sympathy group', with 5 forming a supportive, inner circle. Our sympathy group declines into old age and it is difficult to build new friendships.The innovation is a personalised, matching, introduction, and ongoing support service so lonely older people can rebuild their 'sympathy group' with meaningful friends.Our novel approach leads to several meaningful, enduring friendships as close friends help in ways acquaintances do not and it is meaningful conversations not small talk which boosts well-being.By comparison, third sector loneliness solutions - traditional befriending and group social activities aimed at older people - encourage short-term interactions that do not rebuild the 'sympathy group.Commercial solutions can suffer from barriers due to the price point, and a lack of digital literacy, connectivity or hardware.Our service supports the creation of new friendships enabling people to sustain and broaden their social connections into later life.We also speak to the theme of sustaining physical activity as people with fewer social connections are less likely to be active.We also speak to living well with cognitive impairment as we accept members living with early-stage dementia and provide dementia training to vetted membersWe support people to form meaningful friendships who are often excluded by traditional services for older people.

BuddyHub的“友谊之轮”服务正在解决老年人中的孤独流行病。我们围绕一个孤独的老人与一个代际，支持性的社会团体4，以帮助他们重建他们的社交圈。这个项目将设计和试点一个平行的服务，形成10-15人的团体或“俱乐部”围绕不同的兴趣。这将帮助老年人进一步扩大他们的个人网络，与所有年龄段的成员一起受益于当地的代际友谊。该项目解决的挑战是，四人小组需要支持者的重大承诺，而更大的群体可能具有更长期的适应力。你拥有的朋友数量是你身心健康的关键预测因素。有朋友社交和支持，可以预防疾病和认知能力下降。另一方面是孤独：260万英国成年人总是或经常感到孤独，150万65岁以上的长期孤独者。今天的慢性孤独的65+人的成本仅NHS是每年10亿英镑。证据表明，最大的个人网络规模为150人，按5，15，50，150层排列。情感上的亲密度随着每一层而减少。成年人大多与前15人交往，我们的“同情组”，其中5人形成了一个支持性的核心圈子。我们的同情团体在老年时会衰退，很难建立新的友谊。创新是一种个性化的，匹配的，介绍的和持续的支持服务，这样孤独的老年人就可以与有意义的朋友重建他们的“同情团体”。我们的新颖方法导致了几个有意义的，持久的友谊作为亲密的朋友帮助的方式熟人没有，这是有意义的谈话，而不是闲聊，这是促进良好-相比之下，第三部门的孤独解决方案--针对老年人的传统交友和群体社交活动--鼓励短期互动，而不是重建“同情群体”。商业解决方案可能会受到价格点和缺乏数字素养的障碍，连接或硬件。我们的服务支持建立新的友谊，使人们能够在以后的生活中维持和扩大他们的社会联系。我们还谈到了我们还鼓励认知障碍患者好好生活，因为我们接受患有早期痴呆症的会员，并为经过审核的会员提供痴呆症培训我们支持那些经常被传统老年人服务排除在外的人建立有意义的友谊。