Maximizing satisfaction among the older persons is the goal of modern individualized elderly care and how to best achieve this is of relevance for anyone planning and providing for elderly care services. Purpose of the study: What predicts satisfaction with care among older persons can be conceived as a function of process (how care is performed), and the older person. Inspired by the long-standing person versus situation debate, the present research investigated the interplay between person- and process aspects in predicting satisfaction with elderly care. Design and method: A representative nationwide sample was analyzed, based on a questionnaire sent out to 95,000 individuals using elderly care services. Results: The results showed that person-related factors (i.e., anxiety, health, and loneliness) were significant predictors of satisfaction with care, although less strongly than process-related factors (i.e., treatment, safeness, and perceived staff- and time availability). Among the person-related factors, loneliness was the strongest predictor of satisfaction among older persons in nursing homes. Interestingly, a path analysis revealed that safeness and treatment function as mediators in linking loneliness to satisfaction. Implications: The results based on a large national sample demonstrate that the individual aging condition to a significant degree can be countered by a well-functioning care process, resulting in higher satisfaction with care among older persons.
The aim was to explore how male and female older twins experience their lifelong relationship with one another. Method: Qualitative data consisting of 32 life stories of Swedish older (70+) identical and fraternal twins were analyzed with narrative analysis. Results: Both male and female older twins experienced their twin relationships as the emotionally closest as related to other sibling relationships. Female twins stressed open and frequent communication as an important aspect contributing to closeness in the twin relationship, whereas the male twins related closeness to doing activities together. Dependency was stressed as emotionally draining in the female twin relationships, meaning that both of the twin sisters had not separated emotionally from one another. In contrast, the male older twins talked about competition as an aspect that was emotionally draining. Males and females define emotional closeness differently. The relationship patterns for both female/male older twins remained stable over the life course.
The aim of this study was to explore the experiences of twinship as described by older twins and their siblings. Method: Qualitative data based on interviews with 14 Swedish older (70+) identical and fraternal twins and with 15 siblings to twins, which were analyzed with qualitative content analysis. Results indicate that the siblings particularly in larger families substituted as parents in the raising of the twins, whereas in smaller families the role of the siblings were more unclear. In addition to bonding to one another, both twins also found comfort in having a supportive relationship of their own with yet one other sibling in the family and influential in the developing of the individual identity of the twins. For the siblings of the twins, engaging in the raising of the twins, was a way to prevent the feeling of being unnoticed.
The aim was to explore, describe and understand experiences of twinship as told in the life stories of 35 older (70+) identical and fraternal twins, participants of the SATSA and Gender-studies in Sweden. Method: The open-ended interviews were analyzed with narrative analysis. Results: Twinship was described as relational, i.e, the relationship to the co-twin and as a negotiation between the individual and the twin identity. Three kinds of twin relationship patterns, characterized by different levels of emotional involvement were identified and labelled: nurturing, draining or superficial relationship. An attachment theoretical perspective was used in interpreting the differences in the relationship patterns. Each set of twins showed a unique balance between individualization and the twin identity which also was linked to the type of twin relationship pattern. In addition, these older twins experienced that their social environment tried to impose a twin identity upon them contradictive to their own experiences.
The aim was to explore and describe how older twins reared apart and reared together experience the twin relationship over a life course. Method: The life stories of 30 Swedish older (70+) identical and fraternal twins were analyzed with qualitative content analysis. Results: The relationship patterns among twins reared apart were related to the time of separation, family upbringing, time together after re-union and over the life course. Twins who spent their first years in the biological family and thereafter separated could continue their relationship over the life course, showing the same kind of relationship patterns as twins reared together. Twins who were separated during their first year after birth and reunited several years later showed a more complex relationship pattern, where some lacked an emotionally close relationship and others gradually developed such a relationship over the years. This finding challenges popular views on twins reared apart being emotionally close.