LIVING IN A NURSING HOME: EXPERIENCES OF SUFFERING AND MEANING IN OLD AGE.
Contributors: University of Washington.
Published: 1990
Number of pages: 369
Subjects: Health Sciences, Nursing.; Gerontology.
Description: This study was designed to investigate the experiences of aged residents of a nursing home in terms of suffering and environmental influences on suffering. Suffering was conceptualized as an experience of threat to self or personal identity. Data were collected during a six month period of participant observation in a 145 bed nursing home for Jewish elderly. Data collection included audio-taped interactive interviews with 21 residents who served as key informants. The inquiry focused on three areas: (a) the common experiences of old age in terms of personal identity and how the informants made meaning of these experiences, (b) the influence of the nursing home environment on the aged persons' experiences of old age and daily life in the institution, and (c) the influence of past life and culture on experiences of life in the nursing home.

Content analysis of field notes and interview transcripts produced 41 themes that represented common beliefs or shared understandings of informants about their situations. These themes were organized into four story-lines or domains to produce a thick narrative description. Themes related to the informants experiences of threat to self in old age were organized by the metaphor, going downhill, which described a process of age-related physical decline, accompanied by an accumulation of social losses and a changed relationship with personal time. A second domain included themes associated with the informants' ongoing adaptation to the nursing home as a symbolic environment, a process they described as making the best of it. Third, informants used behaviorial and cognitive strategies of passive acceptance, withdrawal, favorable comparison of self with others, use of distraction, and focus on available choices to cope on a daily basis with the institutional environment. Finally, themes that described how informants maintained a sense of coherence and self worth in the face of their situations included four sources of meaning: a cultural stance toward suffering, personal history, family, and membership in a larger community. Implications of these findings for theoretical development in the areas of suffering, aging, and adaptation to nursing home residency are discussed.
Notes: Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 51-09, Section: B, page: 4277.

Thesis (PH.D.)--UNIVERSITY OF WASHINGTON, 1990.

School code: 0250.