The Application of Salutogenesis for Social Support and Participation: Toward Fostering Active and Engaged Aging at Home

In this chapter, the authors discuss some important aging factors that could increase the likelihood of a stronger sense of coherence (SOC): aging at home, participation, and social support. In his last paper, Aaron Antonovsky (1993) highlighted an example of an intervention among older people, living in their homes, who refused to accept help. He suggested that if researchers had been guided by the salutogenic question of “how to strengthen the comprehensibility, manageability, and meaningfulness of elders,” their intervention research could have been much more sophisticated and rich. The authors are addressing this call. In this chapter, they analyze how social support, active participation, mobility, and other factors can strengthen SOC in old age. They also bring some examples of individual and community programs that are already operating within this salutogenic orientation.

Mobility, Physical Activity, and Social Engagement of Community-Living Older Adults

Mobility, physical activity and social engagement are important to healthy aging and independent living among older adults. This symposium includes four related studies on these issues. Dr. Lien Quach and her team examined racial and ethnic disparities in social engagement among community-living older adults using data from the national Health and Retirement Study. The analysis found that Asians and Hispanics had significantly lower social engagement score compared with non-Hispanic Whites, advocating for further investigations of the causes of racial disparities in social engagement. Dr. Su-I Hou’s study examined the impact of physical activity and social relationship on social engagement. The study found positive impacts of more physical activity, better social relationships and volunteers on social engagement. The results have important implications to promotion of social engagement among older adults participating in aging-in-community programs. Dr. Ladda Thiamwong’s study demonstrated the benefits of using assistive health technology (AHT) to assess the relationships between fall risks, body compositions and objectively measured physical activity in older adults. Dr. Thiamwong’ will discuss the research protocol and preliminary results. Dr. Li’s Health Aging and Neighborhood Study examined variations of older adults’ driving behaviors by sex, age, race, income, health status and housing density of the neighborhoods. The study found substantial differences in mobility and driving patterns by both personal characteristics and neighborhood living environment. The findings have important implications to community programs that support older adults aging in place.

Addressing the California Master Plan on Aging Through Innovative Gerontology Specializations

The 2021 Master Plan for Aging outlines five bold goals to pursue over the next ten years, including addressing the issues of housing, health, and quality of life, finance, and caregiving, the plan also addresses public safety and emergency services, community programs and public spaces, access, inclusion, and equity. In order to prepare the workforce to meet these goals, California Community Colleges have the unique opportunity to collaborate and develop Aging Specialists in fields not traditionally age-focused. This presentation explores the possible scope and path toward curriculum development of five innovative collaborations that will prepare Gerontology specialists for the workforce that will be created through the execution of the California Master Plan.

Socialization Of Community Participation In Bandar Khalifah Village Development Planning Percut Sei Tuan District

The results of observations of the main problems regarding to the activities or socialize participation community programs in the development planning of the Bandar Khalifa village, Percut Sei Tuan district include: a) The people of Bandar Khalifah Village, Percut Sei Tuan District, do not have knowledge about village development planning. b) The people in Bandar Khalifah Village, Percut Sei Tuan District, do not understand the participation activities that can be conducted by them in the village development planning. This activity was conducted in Bandar Khalifah Village, Percut Sei Tuan District in June, 2021. This socialization activity involved village heads and the community in Bandar Khalifah Village, Percut Sei Tuan District and hopefully the participants will be able to implement village development planning activities to encourage sustainable achievements. The conclusions obtained from the results of community service activities in Bandar Khalifah Village, Percut Sei Tuan District are: a) There is a material conformity with the needs of the community to understand the socialization of community participation in village development planning. b) There is a positive response from the community which is shown through discussions in terms of achieving village development planning in Bandar Khalifah Village, Percut Sei Tuan District.

Addressing the silence: Utilising salon workers to respond to family violence

Community programs designed to train salon workers to address the issue of family violence are becoming increasingly commonplace. This article draws on interviews with trainees of one such program called HaiR-3Rs, run by the Eastern Domestic Violence Service (EDVOS) and launched in January 2018 in Victoria, Australia. HaiR-3Rs trains salon workers in recognising, responding to, and referring clients experiencing family violence. Using data collected from qualitative interviews this article reflects on trainee experiences of the HaiR-3Rs program. This article offers insights into whether training salon workers to respond to the issue of family violence places an additional burden of expectation on workers, as well as practical issues and limits of the training. The results of this study suggest that programs like HaiR-3Rs tap into deeper issues about the emotional nature of salon work, and has implications for the hair and beauty industry more broadly.