IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jijerp/v20y2023i4p3011-d1062544.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Perceptions of General Attitudes towards Older Adults in Society: Is There a Link between Perceived Life Satisfaction, Self-Compassion, and Health-Related Quality of Life?

Author

Listed:
  • Anna Sofia Bratt

    (Faculty of Health and Life Sciences, Department of Psychology, Linnaeus University, 35195 Växjö, Sweden)

  • Cecilia Fagerström

    (Faculty of Health and Life Sciences, Linnaeus University, 39182 Kalmar, Sweden
    Department of Research, Region Kalmar County, 39236 Kalmar, Sweden)

Abstract

Negative attitudes towards aging are common in society. However, few studies have investigated how older adults perceive this phenomenon. This study investigated (a) how older adults in Sweden perceive general attitudes towards the older population and whether negative perceptions are associated with low life satisfaction, self-compassion, and health-related quality of life (HRQL), and (b) whether perceived attitudes predict life satisfaction when controlling for HRQL, self-compassion, and age. The sample comprised 698 randomly selected participants, aged 66–102 years, from the Blekinge part of the Swedish National Study on Ageing and Care. The results showed that 25.7% of the participants held negative attitudes towards older adults and reported lower life satisfaction and HRQL. Self-compassion was related to higher life satisfaction, perceived positive attitudes, and better mental HRQL. Overall, perceived attitudes, HRQL, self-compassion, and age predicted 44% of the participants’ life satisfaction. Understanding the factors that influence older adults’ life satisfaction is crucial, as health-related losses might reduce the opportunity for a successful life. Our study makes an important contribution to the field, showing that perceived attitudes explained 1.2% of the variance of life satisfaction, whereas mental and physical HRQL accounted for 18% of life satisfaction.

Suggested Citation

  • Anna Sofia Bratt & Cecilia Fagerström, 2023. "Perceptions of General Attitudes towards Older Adults in Society: Is There a Link between Perceived Life Satisfaction, Self-Compassion, and Health-Related Quality of Life?," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 20(4), pages 1-9, February.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:20:y:2023:i:4:p:3011-:d:1062544
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/20/4/3011/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/20/4/3011/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Edward Helmes & Richard Goffin & Roland Chrisjohn, 1998. "Confirmatory Factor Analysis of the Life Satisfaction Index," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 45(1), pages 371-390, November.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Meike C. van Scherpenseel & Lidia J. van Veenendaal & Saskia J. te Velde & Elise Volk & Di-Janne J. A. Barten & Cindy Veenhof & Marielle H. Emmelot-Vonk & Amber Ronteltap, 2024. "Reframing Communication about Fall Prevention Programs to Increase Older Adults’ Intentions to Participate," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 21(6), pages 1-17, May.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Samy Katumba & Julia Kadt & Mark Orkin & Paul Fatti, 2022. "Construction of a Reflective Quality of Life Index for Gauteng Province in South Africa," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 164(1), pages 373-408, November.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:20:y:2023:i:4:p:3011-:d:1062544. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.