Quality of life of older Chilean subjects living in metropolitan Santiago, Chile. Influence of socioeconomic status

Validation of a Self-Perceived Adaptive Behaviors Scale in Older Chilean Women and Percentiles for Evaluation

Healthy ageing means optimizing opportunities that allow older individuals to participate actively in society without discrimination. Learning adaptive behaviors (AB) may be extremely important for individuals for all stages of life. The goal of this study was: (a) to create a scale for self-perceived adaptive behavior, and (b) propose percentiles for evaluating AB in older adult women. A self-perception scale was created to measure adaptive behavior. Anthropometric and physical fitness variables for 192 older Chilean women (ages 60 to 88) were collected and evaluated. Content validity reflected agreement from 0.75 to 1.0. Construct validity carried out with exploratory factor analysis (EFA) resulted in 11 dimensions with 62 items in groups. Saturation oscillated between 0.62 and 0.85 with the explanation of variation as 46.27%. Cronbach’s Alpha was r = 0.83. The results indicated that the scale developed was valid and reliable for the Chilean women studied. This scale may be used to measure self-perception of AB patterns in older women. Furthermore, the percentiles allow for classification of the AB by age and anthropometric indices.

Public Policy and Experiences of Aging: Social Relationships and Social Integration in Chilean Policy on Aging

This study uses an interpretive narrative approach to compare and contrast assumptions regarding social integration (participation in meaningful and multiple roles, and engagement in social networks) as promoted in the Chilean Comprehensive Policy for Positive Aging, with the expectations of interviewees aged 60 to 74 years. The Policy assumes specific forms of social integration by: offering different options of social integration to dependent vs. independent older people, encouraging autonomy and self-management, and assuming the primacy of family responsibility in older people's care. Both the Policy and the interviewees emphasize the value of autonomy and independence in old age; the latter, however, do not place family at the frontline when care is needed. Understanding the matches and gaps between policy assumptions and older people's expectations for social integration, including the role of family caregiving, can open new possibilities to prevent social isolation and promote different forms of social support that are valued by older adults for their emotional and practical benefit.

Relationships in late life from a personal communities approach: perspectives of older people in Chile

Although the literature on social capital, social support and social networks uses the concept of emotional support, studies rarely recognise nuances of the emotional relationships in late life. Using a personal communities framework, we examine the subjective meaning of family and friendship ties that form the network of emotionally close relationships of a cohort of Chilean people between 60 and 74 years of age. Chile is an interesting case to investigate personal communities, as the country is facing both a rapid process of population ageing and the consequences of abrupt socio-cultural changes triggered by a military government. We conducted qualitative semi-structured interviews using personal communities diagrams that enabled study participants to reflect on what and how different types of personal ties were important to them. Data analysis included thematic analysis of interview transcripts and classification of identified personal communities using Pahl and Spencer's typology. The personal communities framework proved useful in capturing the composition of older people's networks of close relationships and in reflecting the diverse ways different ties are relevant in late life. We further developed a complementary typology based on the distinction between ‘clustered’ and ‘hierarchical’ personal communities. This complementary typology adds a cultural dimension to understand better emotional closeness in late life in a context of rapid socio-cultural changes affecting levels of social trust.