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Own attitude toward aging among nursing home residents: results of the SENIOR cohort

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Abstract

Background

Stereotypes associated with aging are of great concern as extensive literature emphasizes its deleterious effects on physical and mental health of the elderly.

Aim

To assess the relationship between the attitude toward aging and the frailty status of nursing homes residents.

Methods

A cross-sectional analysis of the data collected at baseline in the SENIOR cohort was conducted. All subjects received a diagnosis of frailty based on the Fried’s criteria. They also responded to the Attitude to Aging Questionnaire (AAQ) and other questions assessing their subjective age, the age at which someone stops being considered young or is considered old and the open-ended Image-of-Aging question to evaluate the relationship between their perception of aging and their frailty status.

Results

272 nursing home residents (83.9 ± 8.19 years; 75% women) participated in this study. Out of them, 54 (19.9%) were frail, 182 (66.9%) were pre-frail, and 36 (13.2%) were robust. According to the AAQ questionnaire, frail subjects have a more negative perception of aging (score of 80.3 ± 10.2 points) than pre-frail subjects (83.6 ± 10.8) and robust subjects (86.5 ± 10.5) (p = 0.02). However, the three groups did not differ in the age that would mark, to their opinion, the end of youth (p = 0.93) or the beginning of old age (p = 0.98). The subjective age, rapported by nursing home residents, was not significantly different according to their frailty status. At least, based on the Open-Ended Image of Aging question, the residents’ vision of aging was not different according to the frailty status (p = 0.52).

Conclusion

Based on the AAQ, frail subjects have more negative attitude to ageing compared to non-frail ones.

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Acknowledgements

We thank all nursing homes and residents who agreed to participate in this study.

Funding

This work was supported by the a Fellowship from the FNRS (Fonds National de la Recherche Scientifique de Belgique—FRSFNRS. http://www.frs-fnrs.be).

Author information

Author notes

  1. S. Adam and O. Bruyère  were equally responsible for supervising this work.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Public Health, Epidemiology and Health Economics, WHO Collaborating Center for Public Health Aspects of Musculoskeletal Health and Ageing, University of Liège, CHU-Sart-Tilman, B23, Quartier Hôpital, Avenue Hippocrate, 13, 4000, Liège, Belgium

    Fanny Buckinx, A. Charles, X. Rygaert, J. Y. Reginster & O. Bruyère

  2. Psychology of Aging Unit, University of Liège, Liège, Belgium

    S. Adam

Authors
  1. Fanny Buckinx
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  2. A. Charles
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  3. X. Rygaert
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  4. J. Y. Reginster
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  5. S. Adam
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  6. O. Bruyère
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Fanny Buckinx.

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Conflict of interest

On behalf of all authors, the corresponding author states that there is no conflict of interest.

Ethical approval

All procedures in this study that involved human participants were performed in accordance with the ethical standards of the local ethical committee [approval number 2013/178] and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.

Statement of human and animal rights

This article does not contain any studies with animals performed by any of the authors.

Informed consent

Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.

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Buckinx, F., Charles, A., Rygaert, X. et al. Own attitude toward aging among nursing home residents: results of the SENIOR cohort. Aging Clin Exp Res 30, 1151–1159 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40520-018-1013-y

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40520-018-1013-y

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