Loneliness Among Elderly Persons

This observation concerns a group of six elderly individuals in an institutional setting. All six individuals reside in the same institution. All of the individual are over the age of 70 years, and all are experiencing and are reacting negatively to loneliness.

Social integration refers to the "actual empirical study of the integration of older people into society in its many forms, and the ameliorative strategies designed to enhance or facilitate social integration."1 The "integration of individuals into their society results from forces which place them within the system and govern their participation and patterned associations with others."2 Social values, group memberships, and social roles are "conceived as the axes providing the ties that structure social interaction, place the person in society, and order relations with others. In effect, actors are integrated into society through the beliefs they hold, the positions they occupy, and the groups to which they belong."3

With respect to older adults, one assumption holds that people are well integrated in their middle years, and become less so as they age. Thus, it is thought that satisfactory social integration "might be maintained to the extent that middle age patterns are preserved in . . . advancing age."4

Maintaining middle age patterns, however, is often difficult.5 Aging often "brings with it losses of central social roles

. . .
e primary requirements for the development of effective interpersonal communications with and between elderly persons is the establishment of interpersonal. Interpersonal communications techniques must be learned by elderly individuals experiencing difficulties in the task. Both psychoanalytic and cognitive approaches are useful in the establishment of communication with and between elderly persons.12 Psychoanalysis involves the separation of the psyche into its constituent elements. Psychoanalytic therapy investigates mental processes by means of freeassociation, dreaminterpretation, and interpretation of resistance and transference manifestations. The cornerstones of psychoanalytic theory are (1) an assumption of unconscious mental processes, (2) a recognition of resistance and repression, and (3) and appreciation of the significance of sexuality. When psychoanalytic therapy is applied in the development of effective communications for elderly persons, the individual must be committed to a persistent attempt to develop a self understanding. The individual must be a full participant. Such participation is required for an effective use of the technique of free association. Psychoanalytic therapy for the elderly focus
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Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 2875
Approximate Pages = 12 (250 words per page)

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