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Growing old needs „good strong story“: perspective of narrative gerontology
Chrz, Vladimír ; Dubovská, Eva ; Poláčková Šolcová, Iva ; Hrabec, Ondřej
Our contribution summarizes a number of studies aimed at resilience and integrity in old age. As a unifying Framework, we use a supposition of narrative gerontology (W.Randall), that the good aging is a creative work and the „story we live by“. Narrative gerontology is a part of a more general approach in social sciences, which assumes, that our experience, thinking, acting or identity are construed narratively. The narrative approach enables the understanding of the fact that resilience or integrity in old age needs „good strong story“. The stories that provide continuity, unity, course, and meaning to our experience, can be studied utilizing various types of narrative analysis. Presented are the results of the research of resilience in old age, where we identified several story genres. These are enabling to live the successful life against various troubles, which are connected with old age.
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What accounts for successful aging? – A dialogical self view
Filip, Miroslav ; Poláčková Šolcová, Iva
From the psychological perspective, older adults who are unsuccessful in aging (experiencing, for instance, depression, low well-being, or low life satisfaction) have been often considered unable to accept their own past including life losses. However, such an explanation may be too trivial. For example, an inability to accept the past may be a natural component of depressive thinking and not a separate variable that accounts for depression. Unsuccessful aging can alternatively be explained by focusing on processes of meaning construction of various aspects of one’s own life. The theory of the dialogical self describes these processes in terms of the development of an internal dialogue. An aging-successful older adult should develop a lifereviewing internal dialogue with adaptive features, such as differentiation or integration of various and often contradictory „I-positions.” Methods: Narrative analyses based on the theory of the dialogical self were applied to Life Story Interviews with 32 older adults (aged from 70 to 93 years). According to the presence of the adaptive features in narratives, various types of life-reviewing internal dialogues were identi-fied. The validity of these types was examined by their scores on the Reminiscence Function Scale (RFS). Respondents who used the respective types were compared in terms of well-being (Mood Adjective Checklist - MAC) and meaningfulness of life (Meaning in Life Questionnaire - MLQ). Results/Discussion: The narrative analysis yielded three types of life-reviewing dialogues according to how they are elaborated and adaptive: differentiated dialogue (low adaptive), progressive dialogue, and integrated dialogue (highly adaptive). The validity of these types was sup-\nported by differences on the RFS: participants with the progressive dialogue reported more frequent reminiscence activities to resolve past conflicts and to reconstruct their identity. As hy-\npothesized, scores indicating successful aging on the scales MAC and MLQ were higher in respondents with the integrated life-reviewing dialogue.
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