Social Inclusion (Physical) Scale. The concept of social isolation has been defined in various ways in academic literature. Many authors agree that it is a uni-dimensional concept referring to the lack of social integration [51-54]. However, this assumes that all social contacts have the same social value or importance [54]. Alternate definitions of social isolation incorporate both ‘structural’ and ‘functional’ social support [55,56]. Structural social support is an objective assessment of size and frequency, while functional social support is a subjective judgement of the quality or perceived value of emotional, instrumental and informational support provided by others [57]. The second definition of social isolation is therefore multi-dimensional, including both the minimal quantity and quality of social support. We adopted the latter definition for DOREMI purposes. While social isolation concerns the lack of structural and functional social support, loneliness (described as an outcome in our study, see §1.1.7) relates specifically to one’s negative feelings about that situation [58]. Expanding the distinction further, while social isolation may be either voluntary or involuntary, loneliness is always involuntary [52,59]. To measure social integration we propose the 18-items Social Network Scale proposed by Xxxxxx and Girionda [60] and described in the following Table 16 and Table 17.
