Social Support Mechanisms and the Perception of Social Exclusion among Elderly in Turkish Society
Kübra KÜÇÜKŞEN Rabia KİLCİ Elif Funda ORHAN Aybike Betül MARAL
AbstractElderliness, which is an inevitable ending in the lifecycle of human, is a fact that should be evaluated and dealt with through its physical, psychological, and social dimensions. In historical process, when elderliness used to be recognized as merit and wisdom in terms of traditional period and archaic values by being ascribed to higher status, it has been started to call “grey years” and recognized as negative experience due to effect of change and transformation in the hierarchy of values after modernization process. Today, with increasing life expectancy in the world, the increasing ratio of elderly in general population has been bringing out the problem of social exclusion of elderly population. The purpose of this study is to investigate the perceptions of social support and social exclusion of individuals over the age of 65. In line with this purpose, questionnaire study that relies on random sampling technique has been maintained with 180 participants older than the age of 65 and living in Konya and Tokat provinces. Questionnaire form applied on the sample consists of personal information form, close-end questions that are asked to determine the perceptions of social exclusion, and Multi-Dimensional Perceived Social Support Scale that includes 12-statemet-likert type. According to findings generated from the study, %63.4 of participants state that they have a special person whom they could share their joy and sorrows when %70 of them take the emotional help and support that they need from their families. Lastly, %48.9 of them indicate that their friends support them. This situation shows that family as the initial background of social support systems is in the foreground in Turkish society. In addition to this, results show that friendship relations are important, as well. When statistically significant relationship was found among “the perceptions of social support and social exclusion of individual” and variables such as “age”, “marital status”, “suffering from or not having any chronic disease”, no statistically significant relationship was found among these perceptions and “gender”, “income rate”, and “the number of children they have”.