Involuntary Retirement and Depression Among Adults: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis of Longitudinal Studies

Results from longitudinal studies on involuntary retirement and depression remain controversial. PubMed, Web of Science, Embase, ScienceDirect, Wanfang, and VIP updated on 4 January 2022 were searched for eligible publications. Pooled relative risks (RRs) with 95% confidence interval (CI) were calculated using a random-effects model. Eight published articles with 14,604 participants for the effect of involuntary retirement on depression incidence and 26,822 participants for the relationship between depression and involuntary retirement were included. Compared with working, the pooled RR for depression was 1.31 (95% CI, 1.13–1.51; I(2) = 37.7%) for the involuntary retirement overall. For involuntary retirement, the pooled RR was 1.70 (95% CI, 1.28–2.25; I(2) = 84.2%). The associations between involuntary retirement and depression did not substantially change in sensitivity and subgroup analyses. No evidence of publication bias was found. This meta-analysis indicates that there might be mutual causal relationship between involuntary retirement and depression. More large longitudinal studies with different gender and income levels are needed.