bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
How Elderly People Rank-Order the Quality Characteristics of Home Services
Authors: Edebalk Per Gunnar , Samuelsson Gillis , Ingvad Bengt 
Published: November 2008

AbstractVarious studies have dealt more or less directly with qualitative questions concerning social services provided in the home. While as a result of such studies the general characteristics of home services of importance to elderly people are quite well known, this is not the case regarding the relative importance assigned to such characteristics. Personal interviews using the ‘Multiattribute Utility Technology’ (MAUT) were used. This procedure organises the attributes in a ‘tree’ structure for comparing the relative importance & ranking of different quality attributes. A random sample of 180 receivers of home-help services aged 65 to 95 and living in a rural, small town and city area were interviewed. The interviewed persons were asked to rank-order according to personal importance each grouping of quality attributes. The relative values of the different qualities were determined, using a scale with a range from 0 to 100 points. Continuity, especially Staff Continuity, was the most important quality attribute together with Suitability and Personal Relation. Availability and Influence were the least important quality attributes. The characteristics studied had largely the same relative importance for all older people, irrespective of category.
The Case of Ivan Ilyitch
Authors: Wilson Robert N. 
Published: November 2008

AbstractLeo Tolstoy's short story, The Death of Ivan Ilyitch, is considered as a case history of a seriously flawed life and a consequently inept coping with death. Never having truly lived fully, never having been committed to passionate love or work, Ilyitch in his dying review finds his experience absurdly empty. His death comes to be seen as superficial and meaningless, like his life. It is suggested that people need to be educated for life's failures and death's inevitability.
Ageing, Meaning and the Allocation of Resources
Authors: Moody Harry R. 
Published: November 2008

ABSTRACTDifferent scenarios for an ageing society presume different approaches to the meaning of old age. One scenario anticipates a Prolongation of Morbidity, where quality of life concerns might permit active euthanasia or suicide as a means of saving money. Those who believe in a Compression of Morbidity opt for health promotion to delay morbidity in favour of productive ageing. Optimists look to a scenario of Lifespan Extension, where scarce health resources are not expended for incremental gains in life expectancy but rather for basic research to postpone or eliminate ageing. Finally, those who emphasize Voluntary Acceptance of Limits identify the meaning of old age with voluntary acceptance of finitude, where claims of future generations might limit longevity for any one generation. Thus, contrasting meanings such as quality of life, productive ageing, indefinite survival and voluntary limits entail very different consequences for the allocation of scarce resources across age-groups and among sub-groups of the elderly population.
An Age-Based Mobilisation: The Emergence of Old Age in American Politics
Authors: Elman Cheryl 
Published: November 2008

AbstractOlder people became a highly visible force in the American politics of the 1930s. The Townsend organisation mobilised one tenth of the U.S. elderly population prior to their direct representation in the polity as an interest group. This article utilises several theoretical social movement models to analyse how and why mobilisation occurred. It demonstrates that many factors, including phenomena associated with the social dimension of age, influenced the mechanisms of mobilisation and the movement's shape. Characteristics of this cohort of older people, including its size, life expectancy, spatial distribution, shared traditions, and symbolic frameworks were conducive to club formation and mobilisation. The period event of the Depression also triggered collective action, by exacerbating trends of changing old-age institutional supports. But the organisation expanded most where it channelled inducements to participants and evoked the cohorts' symbolic frameworks and ideals. Mobilisation also occurred within a political environment, the national stage of U.S. politics, where non-represented interest groups (such as elderly people) find it difficult to receive benefits.
Cognitive Control as a Buffer of War-Induced Stress in a Middle-Aged and Older Israeli Sample
Authors: Prager Edward , Solomon Zahava 
Published: November 2008

AbstractThree weeks after the outbreak of the Scud Missile crisis residents of Tel Aviv and the outlying regions, aged 50–91 participated in a study the focus of which was the relationship between personal (cognitive) control of the aversive environmental stimuli and (1) distress in areas of mood and affect, and (2) distress in interaction with the social environment. Personal control was measured along two dimensions: perceived control of the situation and attribution of meaning to events and their outcomes. Findings revealed no significant differences between age categories in levels of cognitive control or in levels of distress. Situation control emerged as the most significant variable in explaining variation in distress scores. Attribution of meaning, though significantly related to situation control, was only a moderately significant predictor of interaction distress. The findings support the thesis that the existence of a causal link between life events and psychological equilibrium makes theoretical sense only when the cognitive structure of such events for individuals is considered.
Age-Associated Memory Impairment: A Suitable Case for Treatment?
Authors: Deary Ian J. 
Published: November 2008

AbstractThe provisional criteria for age-associated memory impairment (AAMI) attempt to define a potentially treatable decline in mental function found in people over 50 years of age. It is suggested here that the present criteria are likely to apply to a large proportion of those over age 50 in the population. From a psychometric viewpoint the criteria have several short-comings that are detailed. Finally, the social and ethical problems of the wider use of such a diagnosis are adumbrated.
Voices of Experience: Talk, Identity and Membership in Reminiscence Groups
Authors: Buchanan Kevin , Middleton David 
Published: November 2008

AbstractThis paper presents a discourse analysis of talk in reminiscence groups. Two main issues are addressed. First, we examine how speakers' identities are accomplished through the way they position themselves in social relationships and social practices of ‘remembered pasts’. Particular analytical attention is given to how people claim entitlements to the significance and consequences of their lived experience. Second, issues of membership are examined through the way people index their engagement in the narrative environment accomplished in reminiscence group talk. Finally, we are concerned with how these narratives contribute to a ‘reconstitution’ of understandings in common about cultural and moral orders of remembered pasts and the historical era in which the reported events, experiences and practices took place. Our analysis aims to demonstrate how reminiscence work affords a context for ‘re-membering’ where older people on their own behalf can work entitlements to voice the consequences of their experiences of life.
Elderly Married Persons Living in Long Term Care Institutions: A Qualitative Analysis of Feelings
Authors: Gladstone James W. 
Published: November 2008

AbstractThis paper focuses on the feelings that institutionalised and community-dwelling spouses have in regard to their own or their spouse's living in a long-term care facility. Qualitative data were gathered from 161 married respondents. Themes associated with positive feelings included: benefit to self, benefits to spouse, reappraisal of self as caregiver, and appraisal of institutionalisation. Themes associated with negative feelings included: concern about institutionalised partner's care, tension with staff, stress associated with visiting, loss of purpose, loneliness, privacy, and tissues related to the marital relationship. Data indicate that feelings about institutionalisation must be analysed in various contexts. Implications for service delivery are discussed.
Citizenship and Old Age: The End of the Road?
Authors: Higgs Paul 
Published: November 2008

AbstractThis paper is concerned with the interlinked issues of citizenship and the structured dependency of older people within Social Gerontology. It argues that implicit in much British Social Gerontology is a strategy of advancing the wellbeing of elderly people through the extension of citizenship rights. Absence of these rights leads to poverty, exclusion and ageism being commonplace experiences of large sections of the older population. This approach draws heavily on the ideas regarding social citizenship of T. H. Marshall who has influenced much mainstream social policy in Britain since 1945. Changes to the Welfare State since 1979 have seriously questioned the validity of this approach and many of these criticisms apply to the structured dependency approach. Recent work on citizenship can help us to see how the relationship between old age and citizenship has changed and how far theory in social gerontology needs to change to take account of these new circumstances.
Behavioural Problems and Distress among Caregivers of People with Dementia
Authors: Chappell Neena L. , Penning Margaret 
Published: November 2008

ABSTRACTThis paper seeks to identify specific problem behaviours related to the distress experienced by informal caregivers of dementia victims. Analyses are conducted using a random sample of caregivers rather than a restricted clinical sample. Distress is measured in terms of both depression and caregiver burden. The findings reveal that specific behaviours on the part of the care receiver are strong correlates of the distress experienced by caregivers. In particular, aimlessness, aggressive behaviours, forgetfulness, and restlessness are correlated with heightened feelings of burden. Apathy or a lack of interest in daily activities is strongly correlated with both feelings of burden and depression. The identification of specific problem behaviours suggests where efforts should be placed in order to alleviate the distress experienced by informal caregivers.
Living Alone towards the End of Life
Authors: Seale Clive 
Published: November 2008

ABSTRACTDrawing on the accounts given by 163 relatives, friends and others who knew a sample of people who lived alone in the last twelve months of their lives, this paper examines a variety of strategies used by speakers to maintain their moral identities. Respondents sought to locate themselves as members of a community of care by stressing their activity in surveillance of the living conditions of those who lived alone, describing their part in the orchestration of help by members of a team of professional and lay carers, and in conducting negotiations over the placement in institutions of people who failed to maintain adequate reputations for independent living. A variety of strategies for justifying or excusing placement decisions—including criticisms of the behaviour of the people who lived alone—are described. At the same time, the accounts are read as a resource for understanding the perspective of the people who lived alone. People who live alone towards the end of life face particularly pressing threats to their capacity to maintain meaning and purpose. Declining physical capacity threatens loss of control and the onset of social death, conspiring to undermine ontological security. The struggle to maintain a reputation for independence in the face of neighbourly surveillance for signs of slippage is described. The paper concludes by identifying a central dilemma for carers: how to provide care that allows its recipient to manage self-identity independently.
Older People with Learning Difficulties Leaving Institutional Care—A Case of Double Jeopardy
Authors: Walker Alan , Walker Carol , Ryan Tony 
Published: November 2008

AbstractPeople with learning difficulties are now surviving into old age and more and more of them are being resettled from long-stay hospitals. The main purpose of this article is to examine some of the key barriers facing, and dilemmas involved in, the provision of community-based services to this newly emerging user group. The findings of some recent field research on older people with learning difficulties who have been resettled into the community are used to illustrate the challenges facing service providers. Particular reference is made to the impact of age discrimination and traditional differences between service specialisms. The article shows that both official definitions of need in old age and the aspirations of the service responses to those needs have been artificially constructed in very narrow terms, especially when compared with the principled approach to service provision for younger people with learning difficulties. In conclusion, therefore, it is argued that the principles underpinning services for people with learning difficulties, such as normalisation, should be applied to older people as well.
Images of Old Age in the Hong Kong Print Media
Authors: Gibb Heather , Holroyd Eleanor 
Published: November 2008

AbstractThe present study set out to identify how the experience of being old in Hong Kong is represented through images commonly recurring in the print media. A case is presented for how the media not only reflect social images and views on ageing, but actively participate in the social construction of views about being old. Two newspapers in Hong Kong, the South China Morning Post (English medium) and the Sin Tao (Chinese medium), were surveyed and contents of stories depicting old age were analyzed, using a qualitative and quantitative methodological design. Dominant amongst the themes was vulnerability in old age. Newspapers used stories according to journalistic formulae to present both negative and positive depictions of old age; however, positive stories carried a sense of the exceptional rather than ordinary life. Results were analysed through a comparison between the two Hong Kong newspapers as well as a comparison with a similar study undertaken on the Australian print media.
The Mask of Dementia: Images of ‘Demented Residents’ in a Nursing Ward
Authors: Golander Hava , Raz Aviad E. 
Published: November 2008

ABSTRACTA description of the social construction of dementia among elderly residents of a nursing ward is offered, based on ethnographic fieldwork conducted in an Israeli geriatric centre. This account focuses on the construction of positive social identities and the ascription of roles for residents labelled as ‘demented’. The findings illustrate the split between personal and social identity in dementia. The applicability of conventional socio-psychological constructs such as ‘I’ and ‘me’ regarding dementia is questioned, as the spoken manifestations of these constructs is critically examined from a symbolic interactionist perspective.
Measuring the Social-Care Service Needs of Impaired Elderly People in Japan
Authors: Nakano Ikuko , Shimizu Y. , Hiraoka K. , Nakatani Y. , Wake J. , Honma A. , Okamoto T. , Izumo Y. 
Published: November 2008

ABSTRACTThis study aims to measure objectively and/or estimate the needs of impaired elderly persons and their families for social care services. The research was carried out in Maebashi, a medium size Japanese city. In our study, ‘impaired elderly persons’ included both physically and/or mentally impaired persons. In total, 693 impaired elderly persons and their families were classified according to 20 specific types of need: these ‘need types’ were cross-tabulated with two sets of factors: (1) Severity of impairments and (2) Difficulty of caregivers in providing the required care. A standard model of the service provision necessary for each ‘need type’ was established through group consultation with social care service professionals. Finally, the total amount of each service required in the city was calculated. Major findings are: (1) Our estimates indicate that 7.1 per cent of all persons 65 and over residing in Maebashi City were physically and/or mentally impaired to a certain degree. (2) Forty per cent of these elderly people were being cared for by caregivers who themselves had serious difficulties. (3) The demand for social care services in local Japanese cities is high. In order for this demand to be met a substantial expansion of both nursing home care and in-home care services is required.
Social Isolation and Loneliness in Old Age: Review and Model Refinement
Authors: Wenger G. Clare , Davies Richard , Shahtahmasebi Said , Scott Anne 
Published: November 2008

ABSTRACTThis paper reviews the empirical literature on social isolation and loneliness and identifies a wide range of published correlates. Using data from a study conducted in North Wales, which included many of the same correlated variables, a statistical modelling technique is used to refine models of isolation and loneliness by controlling for co-variance. The resulting models indicate that the critical factors for isolation are: marital status, network type and social class; and, for loneliness: network type, household composition and health.
The Process of Successful Ageing
Authors: Baltes Margret M. , Carstensen Laura L. 
Published: November 2008

AbstractAs increasingly more people experience old age as a time of growth and productivity, theoretical attention to successful ageing is needed. In this paper, we overview historical, societal and philosophical evidence for a deep, long-standing ambivalence about human ageing that has influenced even scientific views of old age. In recent years, however, discussion of the psychological and behavioural processes people use to maintain and reach new goals in late life has gained momentum. We contribute to this discussion the metamodel of selective optimisation with compensation, developed by Baltes and Baltes. The model is a metamodel that attempts to represent scientific knowledge about the nature of development and ageing with the focus on successful adaptation. The model takes gains and losses jointly into account, pays attention to the great heterogeneity in ageing and successful ageing, and views successful mastery of goals in the face of losses endemic to advanced age as the result of the interplay of the three processes, selection, compensation, and optimisation. We review evidence from the biological and social science literatures for each component and discuss new research avenues to study the interaction of the three processes.
Critical Perspectives on Ageing: New Challenges for Gerontology
Authors: Minkler Meredith 
Published: November 2008

AbstractCritical gerontology may be seen as evolving along two paths simultaneously, one embracing a broad political economy of ageing framework, and the second emerging from a humanistic orientation. This paper will present and highlight the special contributions of each of these pathways to the understanding of ageing and growing old. Emergent feminist perspectives on ageing, and ‘culturally relevant ways of thinking’ about ageing and diversity will then be presented as complementing and extending critical gerontology. The concept of empowerment will be seen as linking all four of these conceptual approaches, and case studies and examples will be used to illustrate the relevance of these alternative perspectives for better understanding and addressing the problems and challenges facing gerontology in the years ahead.
Consumption and Identity in Later Life: Toward a Cultural Gerontology
Authors: Gilleard Chris 
Published: November 2008

AbstractThis paper considers the role of contemporary consumer culture in helping older people re-fashion their own identity in later life. As a result of the expanding role played by consumption in modern mass societies, adult identities now are being denned as much by how people spend their time and money as by the goods and services they can produce. An increasing number of retired people are able to participate in this consumer culture, and in doing so are creating new possibilities of being ‘old’. The contemporary period, whether deemed ‘late’ or ‘post’ modernity, seems to present a growing challenge to the dominance of structures of age, class and gender in defining the nature of our personal identity. There is more emphasis upon the exercise of choice and agency across all periods of the lifespan. The means by which this process is enacted in the lives of pre- and post-retired people should become central to a new, culturally focused social gerontology.
Continuity or Change: Inequalities in Health in Later Life
Authors: Victor Christina R. 
Published: November 2008

ABSTRACTLater life and ill health are perceived as being synonymous. To be old is to be unhealthy, while youth is associated with good health. One result of the widespread acceptance of this stereotype is that there has been little analysis of differences in health status within the post-retirement age groups. Data from the 1980 and 1985 General Household Survey (GHS) are used to consider patterns of health in later life. Using cross-sectional analysis, it is shown that morbidity increases with age. However, even for those aged 85+ the experience of ill health is shown not to be universal. Health status varies between both men and women and between the social classes. These differences are shown not to be the result of the varying age composition of the gender and class groups. The data presented show that there are profound age, gender and class differences in health status in later life and these represent the continuation of inequalities observed within the non-retired population.
Informal Care of Dependent Elderly at Home — Some Swedish Experiences
Authors: Johansson Lennarth 
Published: November 2008

ABSTRACTThis study is an attempt to explore the dynamics in a group of family caregivers in a small rural setting in Sweden. Thirty-nine caregivers giving extensive help to elderly family members, who were all on the verge of institutionalisation, were interviewed. The results showed that the motives of caring were usually based on feelings of reciprocity and that the perceived burden of care was related to the proximity of the carer to the person cared for. Despite the existence of a rather well-developed system of formal care, these resources were poorly coordinated with the informal provision of care.
Communication, Language and the Institutionalised Elderly
Authors: Nussbaum Jon F. 
Published: November 2008

ABSTRACTResearch describing the social world of elderly residents of nursing homes is organised in this paper into three levels of analysis: the institutional level, the relational level and the interactional level. The significance of each level is highlighted, with special attention being given to the interactional level of analysis and the study of language within the nursing home. Data gathered from semi-structured interviews with both elderly residents and nurse aides are presented and interpreted as evidence of interactional problems which may emerge in the resident–staff relationship. Implications and future prospects of incorporating the three levels of analysis into the study of the psychosocial well-being of nursing home residents are considered.