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relationship between attributional dimensions and life satisfaction among elderly residents of congregate housing
The major purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between attributional dimensions related to significant daily experiences and life satisfaction in elderly residents of congregate housing. A secondary, more applied purpose was to determine if any of these dimensions are recommended for reattribution training for the elderly. An attributional model of life satisfaction in the elderly was proposed. Three phases of the study involved pilot interviews, development of the attributional questionnaire, and the formal study of sixty-eight residents of three separate congregate housing facilities in Texas. Eight significant positive and negative daily experiences and related causal explanations for those experiences were identified by the pilot study subjects. A multidimensional coding scheme was used to develop the attributional questionnaire for the formal study. In the formal study residents were individually interviewed with an attributional questionnaire. Later, all participants were given a group-administered questionnaire to assess predictor variables of life satisfaction as well as the resident's life satisfaction. The Life Satisfaction Scale for the Elderly was used to measure the life satisfaction of the residents. Other measures of perception of control, perceived and functional health, peer and family interaction, and socioeconomic status were used to assess the predictor variables associated with life satisfaction. Although the major predictions regarding the significance of and directional differences for positive and negative daily experiences in the attributional model of life satisfaction were not supported, the stability dimension for positive daily experiences was found to have a significant if modest relationship with life satisfaction among the elderly. The importance of understanding the implications of the stability dimension's relationship with life satisfaction was discussed. Recommendations for future research include the applied use of the stability dimension for positive daily experiences in reattribution training, the inclusion of the controllability dimension variable in future studies, investigation of the relationship between categories of life satisfaction and the dimensions, and further study of the attributional dimensions in path analysis to determine directions of causality.
Ph. D. in Counseling Psychology Texas A & M University 1986
Includes bibliographical references (leaves 126-140).