- Title
- “It’s not how old we are; it’s how we are old”: a salutogenic approach to how older Australian women experience ageing and respond to life stressors
- Creator
- Kennaugh, Robyn
- Relation
- University of Newcastle Research Higher Degree Thesis
- Resource Type
- thesis
- Date
- 2017
- Description
- Research Doctorate - Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)
- Description
- The number of older people within the world’s population is rapidly increasing. Within that group, the number of women outnumber men, and as time passes, the number of widowed women has become greater than the number of married women. The impact of this change requires adequate preparation, and understanding the experiences of ageing is an essential step to develop policies regarding appropriate physical and social environments. In addition, adequate services and programmes, aligned with the expressed needs of older adults, can be prepared and implemented. This thesis focuses on the experience of older Australian women, and how they manage the challenges of ageing. The intent of the research was to understand the main issues that are reported by older women to be important, how they cope as they age and how they adjust following changes to their marital status. In addition, the research aims to identify evidence of a Sense of Coherence (SOC), as described in the theory of salutogenesis, particularly as it is identified in the experience of women who describe that they are ageing well. Studies in this thesis applied qualitative longitudinal analyses of data. The method of Thematic Analysis (TA) was used to identify the main themes described by older women during the period in which they were participants in the Australian Longitudinal Study on Women’s Health (ALSWH). A conceptual model was developed, and was applied to the data, which were free-text comments. The main findings were first, that women reported a wide range of stressors throughout their ageing process. Second, women described resources which they could access and use appropriately to counter the negative forces of stressors, and to minimise the reaction of stress that could follow. The third main finding was that many women reported that despite the challenges of ageing, they found ways to manage the circumstances of life, and reported that they were indeed ageing well. The main implications of the findings are that a SOC is an orientation to view life in a way that supports a flexible approach in managing life’s events and associated stressors. As such, the development of a SOC should be seen as a useful strategy, which can be developed during early life experiences, and can continue to be implemented and strengthened across the life course.
- Subject
- ageing well; salutogenesis; sense of coherence; Australian; women; marital status
- Identifier
- http://hdl.handle.net/1959.13/1343089
- Identifier
- uon:29092
- Rights
- Copyright 2017 Robyn Kennaugh
- Language
- eng
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| Thumbnail | File | Description | Size | Format | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| View Details Download | ATTACHMENT01 | Thesis | 6 MB | Adobe Acrobat PDF | View Details Download | ||
| View Details Download | ATTACHMENT02 | Abstract | 977 KB | Adobe Acrobat PDF | View Details Download |