Older adults are a growing segment of the population. The number of single older adults is increasing, making older adulthood a salient developmental period to examine singlehood. In this article, we focus on older adults' singlehood experiences based on marital status and delve into theoretical perspectives and methodological approaches. Specifically, we focus on theories related to the life course and social constructionist perspectives. We include the cumulative advantage/disadvantage model, convalescence model, marital biographies, and social convoy model under life course perspectives and the gender as relational approach, ambiguous loss, and marriage as a greedy institution under social constructionist perspectives. To conclude, we examine how to integrate these theories and methodological considerations to better understand singlehood during later life. The integration of theory and methodologies can help guide research, which, in turn, allows for a more complete understanding of singlehood, which can bolster the quality of life for single older adults.

中文翻译：

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晚年单身：健康和社会关系的理论考虑

老年人是人口中不断增长的一部分。单身老年人数量不断增加，老年期成为审视单身状况的显着发展时期。在本文中，我们重点关注老年人基于婚姻状况的单身经历，并深入探讨理论视角和方法论。具体来说，我们关注与生命历程和社会建构主义观点相关的理论。我们包括生命历程视角下的累积优势/劣势模型、康复模型、婚姻传记和社会护航模型，以及社会建构主义视角下的性别作为关系方法、模糊性损失和婚姻作为贪婪制度。总而言之，我们研究如何整合这些理论和方法论考虑，以更好地理解晚年的单身生活。理论和方法的整合可以帮助指导研究，进而可以更全面地了解单身，从而提高单身老年人的生活质量。