Promoting Social Connectedness for Health Equity: An Application of a New Analytical Framework

On Wednesday, December 6th, from 1-1:50 PM in FXB G12 or online, join us for the third installment in the Center’s Loneliness and Well-being Seminar Series, with guest speaker Dr. Koichiro Shiba.

Accumulating evidence has demonstrated the health effects of social isolation and loneliness, suggesting that population-level efforts to promote social connectedness can be a promising approach to advance public health. However, this body of evidence is mostly based on the current causal inference paradigm, which typically focuses on estimating only the population average treatment effect by comparing extreme and unrealistic exposure distributions. It remains unclear how altering the population distributions of social isolation and loneliness might change social disparities in health. In this talk, Dr. Shiba will discuss these methodological challenges and present results from his recent work that simulated changes in income-based disparities in cognitive functioning among older adults under hypothetical population interventions addressing social isolation.

Dr. Koichiro Shiba is an Assistant Professor of Epidemiology at the Boston University School of Public Health. Leveraging his expertise in rigorous quantitative methodology and causal inference, his research focuses on the population health effects of social isolation and loneliness among older adults. His work also explores how the health and well-being of older adults can be promoted through social engagement, such as volunteering, helping neighbors, participating in religious services, and engaging in local activities and public community gathering places. Before joining Boston University, he was a postdoctoral fellow at the Human Flourishing Program at Harvard University. Dr. Shiba earned his PhD in Population Health Sciences from Harvard University.