The Perceived Security from Being Attached to Child and Life Adaptations of Elderly Taiwanese
Date Issued
2016
Date
2016
Author(s)
Wu, Chih-Wen
Abstract
With the gradual aging of the population in Taiwan society, it’s imperative to facilitate elders’ life easy and comfortable. As a basic need, owning a secure attachment bond is crucial for elders’ life adaptations. To enhance validity of the perspective of attachment theory for elderly Taiwanese, Study 1 as a qualitative study with 17 participants explored the nature of secure attachment bond for elderly Taiwanese and indicated four specific features, namely easy accessing, willingly attending, thoroughly understanding, thoroughly acquainting, and sincerely concerning. These features have been identified as protective factors to help elders deal with negative life events and chronic strains and lower their maladaptive influences. Based on the emphasis of filial piety value in Taiwan society, this article considered adult child as a significant provider of secure attachment bond for elderly Taiwanese and conceptualize a construct ‘perceived security from being attached-to-child’ and developed Attached-to-Child Scale (ATTCS) to measure this construct. By analyzing data from pilot study (152 valid samples) and formal study (202 valid samples), it indicated ATTCS has acceptable coefficient of internal consistency reliability, convergence validity, discriminate validity, and construct validity with two factors, namely Reliable Responsiveness (RR) and Cherishment (CH). Results of structure equation modeling indicated the criterion-related validity of both RR and CH. On one hand, the effect of RR was significant and positive on elders’ positive affection frequency but negative on negative affection frequency and psychological symptom. On the other hand, the effect of CR was significant and positive on elders’ life satisfaction and positive affection frequency but negative on negative affection frequency. Study 2 also verified ATTCS was better relevant to elders’ life adaptations than Who to Attachment Scale (WHOTO; Fraley & Davis, 1997), which was frequently used in previous research. Study 3 further adopted experimental design and recruited 235 elderly participants. The results indicated that priming the attachment bond with adult child relieved the negative affection of threat event for elderly participants scoring high on ATTCS (perceiving higher security from being attached-to-child) but intensified the negative affection for those scoring low on ATTCS (perceiving lower security from being attached-to-child). Study 4 used dyad data from adult children (100 valid samples) and elderly parents (158 valid samples) and indicated adult children who endorsed filial piety belief more strongly facilitated their parents perceiving higher security of being attached-to-child, which also in turn contributes to lower depression but higher meaning of life and freedom in life. For each study, the limitations and future directions were discussed. All findings were organized comprehensively and theoretical implications as well as predictable applications in practice were also proposed in the final.
Subjects
secure attachment bond
elderly life adaptations
parent-child relationship
filial piety
Type
thesis
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