scholarly journals Complexities of elder livelihoods: Changing age-inscriptions and stable norms in three villages in rural West Africa

2018 ◽  
Vol 39 (1) ◽  
pp. 33-47 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tabea Häberlein
Keyword(s):  
Older Adults ◽  
Living Arrangements ◽  
Comparative Research ◽  
Social Norm ◽  
Nuclear Family ◽  
Social Changes ◽  
Creative Solutions ◽  
The Social ◽  
Biological Children ◽  
Intergenerational Contract

The intergenerational contract seems to be a dominant social norm of senior care all over the world, in which  older adults are cared for reciprocally by those for whom they have cared. Yet in three villages in northern  Benin and northern Togo, this intergenerational norm seems to be breached, with older adults living alone  and in poverty. However, standardized surveys from a comparative research project established that kin  groups do not abandon their older adults, if one considers the kin group to be containing classificatory  children instead of the nuclear family with biological children and remittances to substitute for daily care.  This article argues that the apparent contradictions between the intergenerational contract and the actual  practices of providing care in old age are not so stark. The creative living arrangements of older adults in  response to social changes of migration do not challenge the intergenerational contract, but instead are the  ways of fulfilling it. The analytical concept of age-inscription (see Alber & Coe in this issue) helps to explain  the gap between discursive norms and individual creative solutions of senior care. The social norm of the  intergenerational contract persists through new age-inscriptions.

scholarly journals “Not as Bad as I Thought”: Undergraduate Students’ Perspectives on Aging

2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (Supplement_1) ◽  
pp. 5-5
Author(s):  
Nasreen Sadeq
Keyword(s):  
Older Adults ◽  
Social Relationships ◽  
Undergraduate Students ◽  
Living Arrangements ◽  
Course Completion ◽  
Accurate Information ◽  
Social Changes ◽  
Positive Aging ◽  
The Social ◽  
Upper Level

Abstract Ageism remains prevalent in our society and negatively affects older adults. Undergraduate education could be a potential avenue for combating ageism among individuals moving into the workforce. The current investigation is a pilot study in which students enrolled in an upper-level undergraduate course were asked to reflect on how their perspectives on aging had changed following the completion of the course. The course, Psychology of Aging, provides students with an overview of the psychological aspects of aging, including cognitive, physical, and social changes. Consensual qualitative methods were used to explore student responses (N=150) and analyzed using Atlas.ti 7. The results indicated that majority of students had a more positive view of aging following course completion. The three most common themes that emerged were 1) positive aging, 2) living arrangements, and 3) social relationships. For the positive aging theme, students recognized the positive aspects of aging, with many commenting that aging was not as bad as they originally thought. Nearly all the responses in the living arrangements theme reflected students’ previous assumptions that most older adults live in nursing homes. In the social relationships theme, students realized that aging does not make people value social connection any less. The findings suggest that providing students with accurate information about aging has the potential to correct their negative views of aging, and highlight the importance of gerontology coursework in higher education, particularly for those pursuing careers in which they will regularly interact with older adults.

Socioeconomic resources and living arrangements of older adults in Lebanon: who chooses to live alone?

2010 ◽  
Vol 31 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-17 ◽  
Author(s):  
RANIA A. TOHME ◽  
KATHRYN M. YOUNT ◽  
SARA YASSINE ◽  
OLLA SHIDEED ◽  
ABLA MEHIO SIBAI
Keyword(s):  
Older Adults ◽  
Living Arrangements ◽  
Family Health ◽  
Arab Countries ◽  
Economic Resources ◽  
Living Alone ◽  
Social Changes ◽  
Older Individuals ◽  
Socioeconomic Resources ◽  
Western Model

ABSTRACTDuring recent decades, Lebanon has experienced demographic and social changes which, coupled with political instability, have led to waves of youth migration and a higher proportion of older adults living alone. This paper uses the 2004 data of the ‘Pan Arab Project for Family Health’ to assess the levels of various living arrangements and to examine the correlates of living alone, with a focus on economic resources. The findings reveal that 12 per cent of older adults in Lebanon lived alone (17.3 per cent of women and 6.2 per cent of men). Financially better-off older adults and those who reported being satisfied with their income were, respectively, 4.4 and 1.7 times significantly more likely to live alone than their counterparts. The incomes of Lebanese older adults were mainly provided by their children (74.8%) and a relatively small share derived from pension schemes. Contrary to findings from other Arab countries, variations in living arrangements among Lebanese older adults seem to follow the western model whereby wealthier older individuals are more likely to live alone and to be residentially independent. Further studies are warranted to examine to what extent this trend is the result of past migration of adult children who are now established elsewhere and sending remittances home.

scholarly journals Social Network Types and Depressive Symptoms among Older Korean Men and Women

2021 ◽  
Vol 18 (21) ◽  
pp. 11175
Author(s):  
Kyung-Won Choi ◽  
Gyeong-Suk Jeon
Keyword(s):  
Older Adults ◽  
Social Networks ◽  
Social Network ◽  
Depressive Symptoms ◽  
Living Arrangements ◽  
Network Size ◽  
Multivariable Logistic Regression Analysis ◽  
Men And Women ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Impact

This study explores the social network types of older Korean men and women, and the relationship of those networks to depressive symptoms. A population of 4608 older adults who participated in the Living Profiles of Older People Survey (LPOPS) were included in the study. Seven criterion variables—marital status, living arrangements, frequency of contact with children, close friends, and close relatives, participation in social activities, and total network size—were included in a K-means cluster analysis. Multivariable logistic regression analysis of the impact of social network type on depressive symptoms was conducted. We identified two “diverse type” social networks (diverse-married and diverse-unmarried) in women, and one diverse type and one “social-activity-focused type” network in men. Family focused type and two “restricted type” social networks (restricted-couple-focused, and restricted-unmarried) were identified in both men and women. The restricted-unmarried and restricted-couple-focused networks were associated with more depressive symptoms in both men and women. However, the family focused type was associated with more depressive symptoms only in women. The results indicated that social network types, and their impact on depressive symptoms, differ by gender. There is a need for further research on gender differences in the social network types of older adults across diverse cultures.

Thèmes et variations Réflexions stylistiques sur l’itinéraire d’Égérie

2020 ◽  
Vol 59 (1-4) ◽  
pp. 611-621
Author(s):  
Sára Horváthy
Keyword(s):  
Social Changes ◽  
The South ◽  
Hidden Information ◽  
The Bible ◽  
The Social

SummaryEgeria, a 4th century pious woman from the south of present-day Spain, retold, after visiting Palestine with the Bible in hand, her observations to her sisters. If the linguistic aspects of her letters are quite well-known, much less is known about its stylistic value, inappropriately called “simple”.What seems to be boringly the same again and again, is in fact a constantly renewed and perfectly mastered “variation on a theme”, just as in a well-composed piece of music. Her apparent objectivity is indeed a wish to focus on what she considers the most important, namely to tell her community, as closely to reality as possible, what she observed during her pilgrimage. However, Egeria’s latin is also a testimony of the christian lexicon in construction and of the social changes that were in progress by that time.Linguistics and stylistics work together here, the choice of a word or a grammatical formula reveals hidden information about the proper style of an author who, despite her supposed objectivity, had real personal purposes.

MYTHOLOGIZING YORUBA ORATURE: LOBOTO MIZING SWIVELLED PULSES OF LAUGHTER IN NIYI OSUNDARE’S WAITING LAUGHTERS AND REMI RAJI’S A HARVEST OF LAUGHTERS

Imbizo ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 22-42
Author(s):  
Niyi Akingbe
Keyword(s):  
Seasonal Variations ◽  
Agricultural Production ◽  
Oral Tradition ◽  
Literary Work ◽  
Oral Poetry ◽  
Social Changes ◽  
Oral Performance ◽  
The Social ◽  
Momentary Happiness ◽  
Political Turmoil

Every literary work emerges from the particular alternatives of its time. This is ostensibly reflected in the attempted innovative renderings of these alternatives in the poetry of contemporary Nigerian poets of Yoruba extraction. Discernible in the poetry of Niyi Osundare and Remi Raji is the shaping and ordering of the linguistic appurtenances of the Yoruba orature, which themselves are sublimely rooted in the proverbial, chants, anecdotes, songs and praises derived from the Yoruba oral poetry of Ijala, Orin Agbe, Ese Ifa, Rara, folklore as well as from other elements of oral performance. This engagement with the Yoruba oral tradition significantly permeates the poetics of Niyi Osundare’s Waiting laughters and Remi Raji’s A Harvest of Laughters. In these anthologies, both Osundare and Raji traverse the cliffs and valleys of the contemporary Nigerian milieu to distil the social changes rendered in the Yoruba proverbial, as well as its chants and verbal formulae, all of which mutate from momentary happiness into an enduring anomie grounded in seasonal variations in agricultural production, ruinous political turmoil, suspense and a harvest of unresolved, mysterious deaths. The article is primarily concerned with how the African oral tradition has been harnessed by Osundare and Raji to construct an avalanche of damning, peculiarly Nigerian, socio-political upheavals (which are essentially delineated by the signification of laughter/s) and display these in relation to the country’s variegated ecology.

Can Humanism be the Social Norm?

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sharon D. Welch
Keyword(s):  
Social Norms ◽  
Social Norm ◽  
Human Cognition ◽  
Human Reasoning ◽  
Individual Freedom ◽  
Social Divisions ◽  
The Social

Assaults on truth and divisions about the nature of wise governance are not momentary political challenges, unique to particular moments in history. Rather, they demonstrate fundamental weaknesses in human reasoning and core dangers in ways of construing both individual freedom and cohesive communities. It will remain an ongoing challenge to learn to deal rationally with what is an intrinsic irrationality in human cognition and with what is an intrinsic tendency toward domination and violence in human collectivities. In times of intense social divisions, it is vital to consider the ways in which humanism might function as the social norm by, paradoxically, functioning in a way different from other social norms. Humanism is not the declaration that a certain set of values or norms are universally valid. At its best and most creative, humanism is not limited to a particular set of norms, but is, rather, the commitment to a certain process in which norms are continuously created, critically evaluated, implemented, sustained or revised. Humanism is a process of connection, perception, implementation, and critique, and it applies this process as much to itself as to other traditions.

Perceived barriers and contributors to sense of purpose in life in retirement community residents

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-17
Author(s):  
Nathan A. Lewis ◽  
Naomi Reesor ◽  
Patrick L. Hill
Keyword(s):  
Older Adults ◽  
Purpose In Life ◽  
Retirement Community ◽  
Retirement Communities ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Contributing Factors ◽  
Sense Of Purpose ◽  
The Social ◽  
Continuing Care Retirement Communities ◽  
Retirement Facilities

Abstract Despite the growing use of retirement communities and ageing care facilities, little is known about how residing in retirement residences may impact aspects of older adult wellbeing. Living in these communities may hold particular influence on residents’ sense of purpose, if they feel limited in their opportunities for individual action, or could serve to promote purposefulness depending on the social connections available. The current study sought to explore contributing factors as well as barriers to purpose in older adults living in three continuing care retirement communities. Using brief semi-structured interviews, 18 older adults were asked to describe their purpose in life, community-related activities and any perceived challenges limiting their ability to pursue this purpose. Thematic analysis was used to examine themes common across interviews. Interviews presented a mixed picture of the nature of purposefulness in retirement facilities. Residents espoused several benefits of community living such as social and leisure opportunities, while also noting several obstacles to their purpose, including health concerns and the belief that purpose in life was not relevant for older adults. These findings provide insight into how older adults can derive a sense of purpose from activities within their retirement community and how facilities can better tailor programmes to promote purposefulness and support personally valued roles for residents.

scholarly journals The impact of COVID‐19 on the social inclusion of older adults with an intellectual disability during the first wave of the pandemic in Ireland

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Darren McCausland ◽  
Retha Luus ◽  
Philip McCallion ◽  
Esther Murphy ◽  
Mary McCarron
Keyword(s):  
Older Adults ◽  
Intellectual Disability ◽  
Social Inclusion ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Impact
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