Social lives and cliques within senior housing communities

ABSTRACT

A better understanding of social environments will benefit facilitation of social cultures within senior housing communities. Social cliques naturally form among groups of people, particularly those living in close proximity. Research has shown that often older adults experience stigma based upon their health status and are excluded from social groups. This study examined residents’ perceptions of life in senior housing, social stigma, and cliques. Forty-eight residents from two types of senior housing communities participated in the study. Qualitative thematic coding was used to analyze responses to open-ended interview questions. Overall, residents reported satisfaction with the community and their privacy and reported difficulties with distance from family, caregiving, and bereavement. The majority were able to identify cliques, defining them based upon common interests, health status, and shared histories. The most salient finding was that while social cliques existed they were not a source of dissatisfaction or stigma.

KEYWORDS:

• Senior housing
• social interaction
• cliques

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the National Institutes of Health [M01 RR02602].

Notes on contributors

Heidi H. Ewen

Heidi H. Ewen is an Associate Professor and Director of the M.S. in Healthcare Management at the University of Indianapolis and affiliate faculty at the University of Georgia in the Department of Financial Planning, Housing, and Consumer Economics. Dr. Ewen earned her Ph.D. in Gerontology at the University of Kentucky. Her research focuses on senior housing, relocation, aging in place, and aging.

Kara B. Dassel

Kara B. Dassel an Associate Professor and Co-Director of the Gerontology Interdisciplinary Program in the College of Nursing at the University of Utah. Dr. Dassel has served as an affiliate faculty member in the Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences at Arizona State University and for the Center for Gerontology at Western Kentucky University. Her areas of research interest and expertise are in aging, cognitive impairment, and neuroscience.

Jasleen K. Chahal

Jasleen K. Chahal is a Grants Program Manager at University of Kentucky HealthCare in Lexington, Kentucky. She is also a doctoral student in Social Gerontology at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio. She has published on the topics of senior housing, relocation, palliative care, and end of life.

Amy R. Roberts

Amy R. Roberts is an Assistant Professor of Social Work in the Department of Family Science and Social Work and holds an appointment as a Research Fellow at the Scripps Gerontology Center at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio. Her research focus is on quality of life for older adults, social work in long-term care, and adult guardianship.

Ehiremen Azugbene

Ehiremen Azugbene is a doctoral student at the University of Georgia in Athens Georgia and holds a Master of Public Health degree from Florida International University. Ms. Azugbene is a resident of Abuja, Nigeria. Her research interests are in the roles of family matriarchs, maternal influence on health of family, and aging.