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Centre for Policy on Ageing | |
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Researching quality of life in early old age
— the importance of the sociological dimension | | Author(s) | Paul Higgs, Martin Hyde, Richard Wiggins |
| Journal title | Social Policy & Administration, vol 37, no 3, June 2003 |
| Pages | pp 239-252 |
| Keywords | Quality of life ; Rights [elderly] ; Measurement ; Evaluation. |
| Annotation | Measurement of quality of life has become a major feature of much social and epidemiological research in health and social care settings. It is seen as an important alternative to more process-based outcome measures, but remains poorly defined. Quality of life (QoL) research into older populations has focused on measures of health and illness as equivalents of QoL. This paper argues that this response is inadequate, as it reduces old age to a dimension of health, disability and disease. Instead, it is argued that it is necessary to create a theoretically based measure of QoL in early old age which relates to those aspects of later life that are not defined by health. A model of QoL is presented that is derived from aspects of contemporary social theory as they relate to the ontology of later modernity. In particular, this model, the CASP-19 scale, is based on needs satisfaction, comprising as it does four items in the Control domain, and five items in each of the others, Autonomy, Pleasure and Self-realisation. It is argued that this model offers an approach to QoL that integrates a sociologically based model of QoL with a valid research instrument. (KJ/RH). |
| Accession Number | CPA-030627207 A |
| Classmark | F:59: IKR: 3R: 4C |
Data © Centre for Policy on Ageing |
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| ...from the Ageinfo database published by Centre for Policy on Ageing. |
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