Assess the Social Problems and Coping Strategies of Senior Citizens in selected Rural Areas of District Patiala, Punjab

Mr. Prabhjot Singh, Mrs. Parneet Kaur

Faculty of Nursing, Desh Bhagat University, Mandi, Gobindgarh, Punjab, India.

*Corresponding Author Email: prabhpandher@ymail.com; prabhpandher@gmail.com

ABSTRACT:

The present study was conducted to assess the social problems and coping strategies of senior citizens in selected rural areas of district Patiala, Punjab. A non-experimental research approach with descriptive survey design was used to collect the relevant information from 140 senior citizens at village Tarkheri Kalan. The data were collected by conducting a structured interview schedule and then compiled and analyzed by using descriptive and inferential statistics. After analysis, data were presented through tables and figures. Findings revealed that 37% of the subjects usually and 33% of the subjects sometimes feel loneliness. Whereas 39% of the subjects usually and 33% of the subjects sometime experiencing problems due to poor health and the results also shows that 38% of subjects sometime and 37% of the subjects usually economically dependent on others whereas 44% of the subjects are usually and 31% of the subjects are sometimes abused by other people. At last 45% of the subjects sometime and 22% of the subjects rarely experiencing problems related to their family and community members. Study also concluded that majority of subjects i.e. 94.3% had adaptive coping strategies and only a few percentage i.e. 5.7% of subjects had maladaptive coping strategies. The study was limited to the senior citizens staying with their family members. Similar study could be carried out on the problems of senior citizens staying in old age homes and a comparative study could be undertaken in the rural and urban areas.

KEYWORDS: Senior Citizens, Social Problems, Coping Strategies.

INTRODUCTION:

Background:

A man's life is normally divided into five main stages namely infancy, childhood, adolescence, adulthood and old age. In each of these stages an individual has to find himself in different situations and face different problems. The old age is not without problems. In old age physical strength deteriorates, mental stability diminishes; money power becomes bleak coupled with negligence from the younger generation¹. The senior citizens constitute a precious reservoir of such human resource as is gifted with knowledge of various sorts, varied experiences and deep insights². But, recent changes in the size and structure of families have caused the re-arrangement of the roles and functions of the members in the families³.

The World Health Organization (WHO) has projected that world-wide, there are around 600 million persons aged 60 years and over; this total will double by 2025 and will reach virtually two billion by 2050 – the vast majority of them in the developing world. In India, the population of senior citizens was nearly 10 crore in 2011 and is projected to rise to 12 crore by 2016⁴.

Coping is expending conscious effort to solve personal and interpersonal problems, and seeking to master, minimize or tolerate stress or conflict. Psychological coping mechanisms are commonly termed coping strategies or coping skills⁵. When a senior citizen loses a spouse, the loss can be devastating emotionally, physically and financially. And it doesn't matter if the elderly couple were married five or fifty years. The world suddenly becomes a lonely place after the death of a spouse. And that alone can be paralyzing for a surviving senior citizen spouse⁶.

Millions of elderly in India are trapped in misery through a combination of low income and poor health. The traditional support structure of the family is increasingly unable to cope with the problem.⁷ Coping skills are especially important for an older adult, with the number of changes that he has to go through in life, ranging from deteriorating health conditions, loss of a spouse, children leaving home, retirement, isolation, and the worse of them all, institutionalization⁸.

According to Rameeza A, senior citizens face three serious problems viz poverty, disease and loneliness. The elders suffer extreme loneliness, not having anybody to share their thoughts or the burden of day-to-day management⁹. At present, the elderly population in many countries is facing several problems of which deteriorating health is the most important. It is true among elderly population of India also¹⁰.

This was found by Srinivas and Vijayalakshmi that about 80 percent of the respondents experienced verbal abuse, 17 percent some sort of physical abuse and 37 percent felt that their family members neglected them¹¹.

Mahajan studied that around 70 percent of the elderly respondents were abandoned or had no kin to support them and 68 percent felt that they were humiliated and mistreated by the family members in Haryana¹².

Based on the literature review and during the clinical and community posting, the investigator observed and felt that the senior citizens are facing variety of social problems and are adopting various coping strategies. Thus, there is a need to investigate various social problems of senior citizens and various coping strategies used by them.

MATERIALS AND METHODS:

Research Design: Descriptive survey design was adopted for the present study.

Setting of the study: The present study was conducted in village Tarkheri Kalan of district Patiala, Punjab.

Population: The population for the present study was senior citizens ≥60 years of age and living with their family members.

Sample Size/Sampling technique: 180 Senior Citizens were selected convenience sampling from village Tarkheri Kalan of district Patiala, Punjab.

Development and Description of the Tool:

Selection and Development of tool:

The structured interview schedule was used for present study after obtaining approval from the medical and nursing experts in the field of Community Health Nursing. First part consisted of 24 questions to assess the social problems of senior citizens. The maximum score was 120 and minimum score was 24. Another part consisted of 16 questions to assess the coping strategies of senior citizens. The maximum score was 16 and minimum score was zero (0). The reliability of the tool was checked by conducting pilot study on 14 senior citizens in village Bhari Panechan, Distt. Patiala, Punjab and the reliability was found as r = 0.93.

Data collection procedure:

The investigator had obtained written permission from the Sarpanch of the village before data collection. The data was collected in month of March from 03/03/2013 to 31/03/2013. The subjects were approached individually in their houses. Purpose of the study was explained and consent was taken from the subjects. The structured interview was conducted on subjects who were willing to participate. After interviewing the subjects, the responses were analyzed and evaluated.

RESULTS

Table – 1-Analysis of demographic characteristics N=140

Demographic Characteristics	f	%
Age (in years) 60-70 71-80 81-90 Gender Male Female Education Illiterate Primary Middle Higher Secondary Graduate and Above Religion Sikh Hindu Muslim Type of family Joint Nuclear Marital Status Married (Spouse alive) Widow/Widower (Spouse not alive) No. of Children No issue 1-2 3-4 ≥5 Family Monthly Income (in rupees)   ≤5000 5001-10000 10001-15000 ≥15001 Source of Income Remittance from Children Pension Self-Employment	69 61 10 69 71 41 51 26 19 3 116 8 16 102 38 122 18 1 70 66 3 22 18 24 76 83 41 16	49.3 43.6 7.1 49.3 50.7 29.3 36.4 18.6 13.6 2.1 82.9 5.7 11.4 72.9 27.1 87.1 12.9 0.7 50.0 47.1 2.1 15.7 12.9 17.1 54.3 59.3 29.3 11.4

Table 2-Responses of subjects related to selected social problems of senior citizens N=140

Sr. No.	Problems related to	Always	Usually	Sometimes	Rarely	Never
1.	Loneliness	119 (17%)	258 (37%)	229 (33%)	93 (12%)	1 (1%)
2.	Poor Health	110 (16%)	276(39%)	229 (33%)	76 (11%)	9 (1%)
3.	Economic Dependence	44 (6%)	259 (37%)	269 (38%)	116 (17%)	12 (2%)
4.	Abuse	130 (18%)	307 (44%)	220 (31%)	41 (6%)	2 (1%)
5.	Family and Community	57 (10%)	115 (21%)	250 (45%)	124 (22%)	14 (2%)

*Figures in parenthesis indicate percentage

Table 2 depicts that 37% of the subjects usually and 33% of the subjects sometimes feel loneliness. Whereas 39% of the subjects usually and 33% of the subjects sometime experiencing problems due to poor health and the results also shows that 38% of subjects sometime and 37% of the subjects usually economically dependent on others whereas 44% of the subjects were usually and 31% of the subjects were sometimes abused by other people. At last 45% of the subjects sometime and 22% of the subjects rarely experiencing problems related to their family and community members.

Table 3. Responses of the study subjects related to Coping Strategies N = 140

Sr. No.	Questions	Yes	No
1.	Spend time chatting with others?	130 (93%)	10 (7%)
2.	Try to isolate from others?	127 (91%)	13 (9%)
3.	Curse God for the present situation?	107 (76%)	33 (24%)
4.	Curse family members?	83 (59%)	57 (41%)
5.	Get involve in recreational activities?	97 (69%)	43 (31%)
6.	Participate in household routines?	126 (90%)	14 (10%)
7.	Exercise your body in some way each day?	70 (50%)	70 (50%)
8.	Keep busy with prayer?	100 (71%)	40 (29%)
9.	Help others?	129 (92%)	11 (8%)
10.	Seek advice or help from others to resolve your problems?	123 (88%)	17 (12%)
11.	Thinks future will be better?	110 (79%)	30 (21%)
12.	Change negative thoughts into positive?	127 (91%)	13 (9%)
13.	Sitting alone and speak to self?	44 (31%)	96 69%)
14.	Try to forget painful experiences?	123 (88%)	17 (12%)
15.	Thought of many ideas before deciding what to do?	138 (99%)	2 (1%)
16.	Shout at others?	130 (93%)	10 (7%)

*Figures in parenthesis indicate percentage

Table 3 shows the responses of the subjects related to Coping Strategies of Senior Citizens. Majority (99%) of the study subjects used the coping strategy i.e. "think many ideas before deciding what to do" followed by 93% who spent time chatting with others and shout at others, 92% help others, 91% tried to isolate from others, 90% participated in household work, 88% tried to forget painful experiences, 79% thought that future will be better, 76% cursed God for present situation and 71% kept themselves busy with prayer.

Table -4-Distribution of the coping strategies of the senior citizens

N=140

Coping Strategies N	Percentage
Adaptive 132	94.3%
Maladaptive 8	5.7%

Table 4 shows that 94.3% of the subjects had adaptive coping strategies followed by 5.7% who had maladaptive coping strategies.

Table –5- Relationship between social problems and coping strategies of senior citizens N =140

Descriptive Statistics	Scores
	Coping Strategies	Social Problems
Mean Score	12.60	60.51
Median Score	13	59
S.D.	2.263	10.805
Max Possible	16	120
Minimum Possible	0	24
Range of Possible(MAX-MIN)	16	96
Maximum Obtained	16	86
Minimum Obtained	4	36
Range of Obtained (MAX-MIN)	12	50
Scored	1764	8471
Total Score	2240	16800
Mean Percentage %	78.75	50.42
Pearson's Correlation	-0.518
Table Value at 0.05	0.532
Result	Negative Direction but not significant correlation

Table 5 represents the relationship between social problems and coping strategies of senior citizens. The results revealed that there is negative direction but not significant correlation between social problems and coping strategies of senior citizens.

Fig. 1 Bar diagram showing distribution of subjects as per their coping strategies

Fig. 1 represents that 94.3% of the subjects had adaptive coping strategies followed by 5.7% who had maladaptive coping strategies.

Table 6 depicts the association between social problems of senior citizens and selected demographic variables. The results revealed that there was a significant association between age, gender, education, type of family and marital status and social problems of senior citizens.

Table – 6-Association between social problems of senior citizens and selected demographic variables N = 140

Sr. No.	Demographic Characteristics	Social Problems		SD	P Value	Result
		Score Obtained	Mean Score
1.	Age (in years) 60-70 71-80 81-90	3996 3782 693	57.91 62.00 69.30	9.519 10.607 14.690	0.002	S
2.	Gender Male Female	4015 4456	58.19 62.76	11.506 9.631	0.012	S
3.	Education Illiterate Primary Middle Higher Secondary Graduate and Above	2655 3067 1533 1069 147	64.76 60.14 58.96 56.26 49.00	11.627 9.516 9.788 11.060 8.544	0.009	S
4.	Religion Sikh Hindu Muslim	7087 430 954	61.09 53.75 59.63	10.892 12.245 8.632	0.180	NS
5.	Type of family Joint Nuclear	6003 2468	58.85 64.95	9.588 12.643	0.003	S
6.	Marital Status Married (Spouse alive) Widow/Widower (Spouse not alive)	7265 1206	59.55 67.00	10.204 12.737	0.001	S
7.	No. of Children No issue 1-2 3-4 ≥5	36 4201 4053 181	36.00 60.01 61.41 60.33	NA 10.695 10.593 13.577	0.124	NS
8.	Family Monthly Income (in rupees) ≤5000 5001-10000 10001-15000 ≥15001	1426 1139 1461 4445	64.82 63.28 60.88 58.49	13.412 11.177 9.475 9.934	0.059	NS
9.	Source of Income Remittance from Children Pension Self-Employment	5152.00 2380.00 886.00	62.07 59.50 55.38	10.557 10.278 12.236	0.102	NS

S- Significant (p<0.05), NS- Non Significant (p>0.05)

Table – 7. Association of coping strategies of senior citizens and selected demographic variables N = 140

Sr. No.	Demographic Characteristics	Coping Strategies		Yates/ Chi Test	df	Table Value	Result
		Adaptive	Maladaptive
1.	Age (in years) 60-70 71-80 81-90	67 56 9	2 5 1	0.882	2	5.991	NS
2.	Gender Male Female	67 65	2 6	1.104	1	3.841	NS
3.	Education Illiterate Primary Middle Higher Secondary Graduate and Above	36 48 26 19 3	5 3 0 0 0	3.866	4	9.488	NS
4.	Religion Sikh Hindu Muslim	109 8 15	7 0 1	0.206	2	5.991	NS
5.	Type of family Joint Nuclear	97 35	5 3	0.072	1	3.841	NS
6.	Marital Status Married (Spouse alive) Widow/Widower (Spouse not alive)	118 14	4 4	7.227	1	3.841	S
7.	No. of Children No issue 1-2 3-4 ≥5	1 67 61 3	0 3 5 0	4.524	3	7.815	NS
8.	Family Monthly Income (in rupees) ≤5000 5001-10000 10001-15000 ≥15001	19 18 23 72	3 0 1 4	1.610	3	7.815	NS
9.	Source of Income Remittance from Children Pension Self-Employment	77 39 16	6 2 0	0.338	2	5.991	NS

Significant (p<0.05), NS- Non Significant (p>0.05)

Table 7 shows the computed chi square value of association between the coping strategies of senior citizens with selected demographic variables. The results revealed that there was significant association found between marital status and coping strategies.

DISCUSSION:

Social problems of subjects were assessed by conducting structured interview schedule. Mean score of social problems of senior citizens was 60.51 with SD of 10.805. A similar study conducted by Helpage India revealed that One third (32%) of the elderly reported to be free from any health problem, while two fifth (42%) reported to be having one or more chronic diseases such as Diabetes, Hypertension and Arthritis. About one third (34%) of the elderly desired to get preference in facilities such as health, transport etc. provided by the Government in terms of being served without waiting time.¹³

Mean score of coping strategies of senior citizens was 12.60 with SD of 2.263. Findings revealed that senior citizens were using spiritual coping along with problem-focused and emotion-focused coping strategies. Similarly, a study conducted by Mhaske R. S. and Ram U. performed on gender differences in coping ways and mental health among the institutionalized aged found that old age people do not use only problem-focused and emotion-focused coping, but also turn to religious and spiritual coping to a large extent.¹⁴

The results revealed that there was negative direction but not significant correlation between social problems and coping strategies of senior citizens.

In contrast to these results, a study performed by Thakker D. V. on coping strategies of stress by senior citizens residing at old age homes and living with family members found positive correlation between stressors and coping strategies of senior citizen living with family.¹⁵

RECOMMENDATIONS:

1. The study could be replicated in urban area.

2. A similar study could be carried out on the problems of senior citizens staying in old age homes

3. A comparative study could be conducted among urban and rural population.

REFERENCES:

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11. Srinivas, Vijayalakshmi. Extent and Nature of Elder Abuse in Indian Families: A Study in Kerala [Internet]. http://www.helpageindia.org/helpageprd/download.php?fp=aW1hZ2VzL3B1Ymxpc2hpbmc=andf=MTMyMjU1OTQ4Ny5wZGY= [Accessed Jan 14 2012]

12. Mahajan A. “Problems of Aged in Unorganised Sector : A Case Study of Old Age Pentioners in Haryana State”, Guru Nanak Journal of Sociology, 7 (2), 109-123. [Accessed Jan 14 2012]

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14. Mhaske RS, Ram U. Gender Differences in Coping Ways and Mental Health among the Institutionalized Aged in Pune. Indian Journal of Gerontology Available from: http://www.gerontologyindia.com/pdf/vol-23-3.pdf [Accessed Jan 10 2012]

15. Thakker DV. A Comparative Study of Coping Strategies of Stress by Senior Citizens Residing At Old Age Homes and Living with Family Members. International Journal of Scientific Research Available from: http://theglobaljournals.com/ ijsr/file.php?val=ODE4 [Accessed March 24 2012]

Received on 05.02.2015 Modified on 14.03.2015

Accepted on 26.05.2015 © A&V Publication all right reserved

Asian J. Nur. Edu. and Research 5(3): July- Sept.2015; Page 331-336

DOI: 10.5958/2349-2996.2015.00068.3