Sovremennye Issledovaniâ Socialʹnyh Problem (Aug 2018)
SELF-REPRESENTATIONS OF OLDERLY PEOPLE WITH DIFFERENT AGING TYPES
Abstract
Theme of the study. Self-representations of the elderly with different types of aging. Subject of the study: the categorical structure of self-representations reflected in the I-concept of the elderly. Purpose. The scientific goal of this study is to investigate the types of psychological support for elderly people, thus, their self-representations have been studied and related to a type of aging. This goal has been evoked by the fact that nowadays there is a lack of published studies on psychological support for elderly people that cover features of that period of aging. Methods. Semi-structured interview has been chosen to determine the type of aging (method of A. Kachkin). Content analysis of the essay “I am a person” has provided elderly’s representations of themselves. Results. The empirical study has shown the number of elderly people that require psychological support – almost 50%. Those people live their lives without any hope or interests; they have the psychological type of aging that is called “fading away”, during which elderly people are basically waiting to die. The other 50% have demonstrated a more positive example of an active, creative and thoughtful way of life that an elderly person can have in spite of difficult living conditions, frustration and low of social status. Conclusions. The results have revealed the correlation between the types of aging and subjective psychological characteristics of elderly people, which allows to proceed to the next phase of the study – construction of the specialized help for the elderly, based on their self-representations. Practical implications. The results of the study have become the foundation of a psychology program for the educational project “University of elderly people 2.0” organized by Association of Samara State University Alumni. This article is funded by the Presidential Grants Fund (project 17-2-005755).
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