Abstract

This research was carried out to determine if psychosocial adjustment improves for elderly persons engaged in volunteer activity. Questionnaires were completed by 27 persons aged 60 or over before and two months after beginning volunteer activity at one of 33 Florida community hospitals. A control group of 37 persons without hospital volunteer experience also completed these two questionnaires, which covered several aspects of psychosocial adjustment, including self-esteem, life satisfaction, sense of control, optimism, anxiety, depression and somatization. An analysis of covariance with repeated measures indicated that there was no significant improvement in subjective well-being associated with volunteer activity after accounting for the influence of background factors. Recommendations for future research include greater control over the variability of the volunteer setting and the importance of involving persons initially experiencing low levels of psychosocial adjustment, factors which may be responsible in this case for the lack of significant treatment effects.

Notes

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Graduation Date

1987

Semester

Spring

Advisor

Tucker, Richard

Degree

Master of Science (M.S.)

College

College of Arts and Sciences

Department

Psychology

Degree Program

Clinical Psychology

Format

PDF

Pages

48 p.

Language

English

Rights

Public Domain

Length of Campus-only Access

None

Access Status

Masters Thesis (Open Access)

Identifier

DP0021485

Contributor (Linked data)

Richard Tucker (Q60029401)

Accessibility Status

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