published_or_final_version / Social Work / Master / Master of Social Work

published_or_final_version / Social Work / Master / Master of Social Work

published_or_final_version / Community Medicine / Master / Master of Public Health

No description available.

Globally, old age has been identified as one of the key causes of poverty. Governments all over the world have taken the initiative to introduce policies aimed at protecting the elderly from poverty. However in most developing countries, the plight of the elderly often falls on the informal systems of care such as the extended family. This often leaves the elderly more vulnerable to poverty as the informal systems of care are becoming increasingly unreliable. This study explored the impact which an economic crisis characterized by hyperinflation and high unemployment had on the lives of elderly persons in a suburb called Mucheke in Masvingo, Zimbabwe, focusing mainly on their social networks. Most of the literature on Zimbabwe emphasizes that often people who are institutionalized in old age homes in Zimbabwe were those people who had weaker social networks, particularly due to the fact that they were of foreign origin. These individuals did not have an extended family they could rely on in Zimbabwe, whilst at the same time their links with their families had been broken due to a prolonged stay in a foreign country. Black locals rarely sought to be institutionalized in old age homes. However with the economic crisis, many facets of the elderly people’s lives were altered. These alterations included the depletion of the extended family’s capacity to continue its role of providing care to the elderly as resources were limited. The government on its own had been paralyzed by the economic crisis and no longer provided care for the destitute and desperate elderly people as had been the norm. The elderly established different coping strategies to see them through the crisis. The civil society also began to play a more central role in assisting the needy as the crisis worsened. / Thesis (M.Dev.Studies)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, 2009.

The purpose of this study was to construct and use an instrument to assess the adjustment of aged residents in an institution.

This study concerns the characteristics of fund development directors employed in selected homes for the aged. The first purpose of this study is to develop a profile of job functions, through task analysis, among development directors in charitable homes for the aged. The second purpose of this study is to develop a profile of personal characteristics of development directors of charitable homes for the aged based on the following characteristics: age, sex, educational background, experience outside development, membership in community organizations and amount of specific training in fund development. One instrument was used to gather data for the study. It was distributed to a population of 29 development directors in charitable homes for the aged in Arkansas, Louisiana, Oklahoma, New Mexico, and Texas. This population was predetermined by an initial survey form sent to 193 chief executive officers in the five states mentioned above. Twenty-nine reported formalized programs employing a full-time person with at least a part-time involvement in fund development activities. Of the twenty-nine development directors surveyed, fifteen usable instruments were received (52 percent). A program was used for the survey that included crosstabulation of social characteristics, success in fund raising, length of time in position and educational preparation. Coded responses were manually typed into the computer. To accomplish the desired analysis, percentages and frequencies were used to treat the data. These non-Parametric procedures provide an understandable overview of the data obtained and are appropriate for the research questions. These procedures permit a summarization of the data in a manageable form. Following the tabulation of frequencies and percentages, Fischer's Exact Probability Test was computed to determine if significant relationships between actual preparation and needed preparation, personal characteristics, educational preparation, and success and usefulness of experience exist.

The primary focus of this organizational study of thirty two homes for the aged was to explore the degree of difference between administrator (expert) and resident (consumer) judgments of the psycho-social environment of their homes and to detect organizational variables which might account for these differences. It was hypothesized that adequate communication linkages to the homes would be negatively correlated with resident-administrator differences in viewpoints of the psychosocial environment. Adequate communication linkages were defined as those which approximated a model of linkage adequacy derived from the ''balance theory of coordination" postulated by Eugene Litwak. Based on a multimodel theory of organizational structure it calls for mechanisms of coordination between antithetical organizational substructures to insure sufficient closeness for communication but sufficient distance to prevent conflict. A secondary focus of this study was the substantive findings regarding resident viewpoints of the psychosocial environment irrespective of their differences from administrators. The concept of "psychosocial environment" was defined and operationalized by Allen Pincus who developed an instrument (HDQ) for measuring the degree of privacy, freedom, social resources, and integration into the larger community provided by the psychosocial environment of homes for the aged. The study hypothesis was not supported by correlational findings; however, linkage adequacy ratings did account for seven percent of the variation in administrator-resident differences when entered into a regression analysis with variables measuring contacts between administrator and residents and residential participation in group activities. Of significance at the .05 level was the age of the administrators with the younger ones tending to have fewer differences from the residents; administrators' ranking of professional staff meetings and communications with the housekeeping staff as useful sources of information about their residents; and higher mean resident HDQ Dimension II (freedom) scores. A multiple regression analysis of these variables plus the mean home ratings of resident friendliness to staff accounted for 55% of the variation in resident-administrator differences. These findings support the balance theory of coordination in that they reflect both distancing mechanisms (indirect linkages; i.e., administrator-staff contacts) and conditions which promote closeness (resident friendliness to staff). The age of the administrator, positively correlated with resident-administrator differences, reflected greater reliance by the younger administrators on their staffs and less control by their boards. Neither resident age, health, size of home, socio-cultural similarity between resident and administrator, nor the degree of informal administrator contact with residents were associated with resident-administrator differences. Resident scores on the HDQ suggest the psychosocial environments of the homes providing a great deal more privacy than a lack of privacy, more integration into the larger community than isolation, slightly more social resources rather than a lack of social resources, and as much freedom as structure. Those variables negatively associated with the dimension scores on a home by home basis included poorer ratings on resident mental health, mobility, and physical isolation. Homes with a greater degree of board control less participating activities and where residents tended to take their complaints to the administrator tended to have less freedom. Homes located in the country, with a resident council and social worker and with frequent administrator-resident contacts tended to score higher on the resource dimension. Implications for social planning include greater confidence in the older consumer as a source of informational feedback and increased scrutiny of administrator viewpoints especially as they relate to utilization of staff. The study suggests that planning must be geared to providing for the needs for the immobile, mentally impaired, isolated resident as well as stimulating administrative and structural changes which allow for a greater degree of freedom and social resources.

This dissertation is the culmination of over two years of fieldwork at a residence for indigent elderly and disabled people situated in the neighborhood of Park Slope in the borough of Brooklyn, New York. The research methodology relied heavily on participant observation, as well as a semi-structured formal interview on a select group of informants, to gain a local perspective on the direct and indirect social effects of institutional policies towards indigent elder populations receiving funding from federal and state level agencies. Using theoretical models from medical and psychological anthropology on cultural studies of death, grieving, and mourning, this analysis focuses on entitlement/benefit policies and their social impact on the organizational structure at a geriatric residential complex. Especially salient were the notions of self-identity and the coping strategies used by the elderly poor and the people who are involved in their care to make do with their low social and economic positioning. At this site, in their everyday routines, older adults faced a myriad of challenges imposed by the lack of clarity and consistent change surrounding implementation of these benefits by various outside institutions. In this diverse setting, social work staff engaged in care-taking practices in the hope of addressing inequalities experienced by the tenant population. Subsequently, social workers became key participants in maintaining the measurements of equality used to determine eligibility for such resources. This was due in part to their gatekeeper status within the privately funded charity-based organization for the diverse sets of residents supported by a mix of private and public entities using federal and state funds. Ultimately, the regulations designed to alleviate inequality created boundaries among tenants and were a source of tension embroiled in larger issues surrounding ethnic, linguistic, and social difference. By exploring the ways in which professional experts with authoritative-knowledge guided and interacted with the elderly-poor at one independent living facility, the research addresses the growing complexity shadowing affordable housing for older adults in the United States as the populace at large continues to diversify. In addressing how these initiatives were enacted and allocated under these conditions, one of the main aims of this research was to reveal how conflicts and struggles emanating from them were managed.

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