Social support and loneliness of elderly women telecare users
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Abstract
Loneliness is a negative subjective experience based on the evaluation of the quality and the amount of the individual’s social interactions. Older adults’ social networks decrease because of losses associated to widowhood, retirement and an adaptive selection process; they eliminate those relations who are less intimate and the emotionally significant contacts are the only ones who remain. Because of these and other factors, elderly women who live alone were identified as being in major risk of feeling lonely. Objectives. 1. Learning about the prevalence of loneliness in a sample of older women who are users of a telecare service; 2. Identifying the characteristics of their social support network; 3. Establishing associations between loneliness and sociodemographic characteristics and between loneliness and social network. Method. Quantitative research with a cross-sectional design. Data was collected from a sample of 267 women (70-90 years old), who were users of a telecare service and lived alone in the city of Valencia. Researchers assessed feelings of loneliness, received social support and sociodemographic characteristics. Results. The mean loneliness score was 3.98 (SD = 2.827). Pearson correlation tests suggested negative and statistically significant associations between loneliness and received social support both from family members (r = -.401, p greater than .01) and from friends (r = -.416, p greater than .01). No significant differences were found in loneliness scores based on the sociodemographic variables. Conclusions. The prevalence of loneliness in this study was slightly higher than that of other elderly people’s samples, but the results confirmed the important association between loneliness and social support. In conclusion, the intervention programs intended to reduce loneliness should promote the interchange of social support and pay special attention to the older adults who are more isolated.
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