Dr Liu first situated this research in the context of rapid population ageing process in China. Therefore, there is an increasing demand for age-friendly neighbourhoods. China plans to create 5000 exemplary age-friendly neighbourhoods nationwide in response to the population ageing.

She reviewed the literature on the relationship between neighbourhood environments and older adults’ mental health. She found that few studies have addressed the cumulative effects of neighbourhood environments and individual (dis)advantages on older adults’ mental health. Also, existing frameworks have failed to capture the diversity of rural neighbourhoods. This study investigated this issue by analysing the data from China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study. The baseline survey was conducted in 2011, while follow-ups were in 2013, 2015 and 2018. Pattern-mixture model is applied to address the MNAR missingness. Dependent variables are used to indicate mental health level, while independent variables are used to estimate functional abilities. Latent growth curve models are used. 

Dr Liu finds that age-friendly neighbourhood environments significantly buffered the negative impacts from the possibility of future functional decline among older adults with better functional abilities at baseline. Cumulative effects of age-friendly neighbourhood environments reduce the increasing rate of depressive symptoms over time. 

The discussion was about the disparity between rural and local elder adults and the selection of variables.