TITLE:
A Study to Examine the Relationship between Social Support and Perception of Being Institutionalized among the Elderly Aged 65 Years and Above Who Are in Institutions in Bulawayo Urban, Zimbabwe
AUTHORS:
Sifisokuhle I. Dhlamini-Sibanda, Virgininia Dube-Mawerewere, Grace Nkhoma, Clara O. Haruzivishe
KEYWORDS:
Elderly, Social Support, Perception, Institutionalized
JOURNAL NAME:
Open Journal of Nursing,
Vol.7 No.8,
August
18,
2017
ABSTRACT: Policies on the elderly in Zimbabwe are based on social networks and social capital in which the care of the elderly rests with the adult children and other relatives including the community. It is argued that social networks and social capital are informal and the weakness in these informal types of social support is that they are difficult to maintain in cases of urbanization, migration and socio-economic hardships. The study sought to examine the relationship between social support and the perception of being institutionalized among the elderly aged 65 years and above who were in institutions in Bulawayo urban. A descriptive quantitative cross-sectional correlational survey method was used. A simple random sampling method was used to recruit respondents. The sample size in this study was 81 respondents. Data was collected using the interview schedule. Analysis was done using the Statistical Package Social for Sciences (SPSS) package, descriptive and inferential statistics. The Pearson’s correlation coefficient showed the relationship between social support and perception of being institutionalized as follows; r = 0.181, p = 0.107. This shows that there is no relationship between social support and perception of being institutionalized among the elderly aged 65 years and above who are in institutions in Bulawayo urban, Zimbabwe.