Tekijät

• Lumme-Sandt, Kirsi (University of Tampere. Tampere School of Public Health)

Asiasanat

Finnishness, ageing, care of the elderly, health, interpersonal relations, loneliness, minority groups, old age, social problems

Sisällön kuvaus

The material is part of the research project on ageing and immigration, conducted in the University of Tampere. Some questionnaire questions are the same as in the Finnish GOAL (Good Ageing in Lahti region; Ikihyvä in Finnish) survey targeted at people aged over 50 years.

First, the respondents' demographics were charted in the questionnaire. Their age, marital status, country of birth, education, occupation, current employment status, housing history, time spent in Canada, health, disabilities, ability to live actively and use of health care services were queried.

Social relationships were explored through asking the respondents how many children, sisters and brothers they had and where they lived. They were also asked about their ways of being in contact with their friends and relatives. Offering and receiving help were investigated by asking whether the respondents took care of a chronically ill, aged, or disabled person, who the respondents received help from, what kind of help the respondents received and how often, and who they offered help to.

Experiences of ageing were probed by asking the respondents for example whether they felt themselves younger or older than they really were, whether they had experienced their age as an advantage or drawback, whether they considered ageing hard, whether they felt their lives lacked joy, whether they were afraid of dementia, whether they considered religion important, whether they felt themselves old or lonely, and whether they felt solidarity with previous and following generations. The respondents gave their views on retiring and on worries related to ageing. In addition, they were queried whether they thought to be able to perform their daily tasks after five years, and how they would spend their retirement years if they were able to select freely.

Finally, the respondents answered various questions on Finnishness, hobbies, dreams, worries, joys, and sorrows.

Background variables included the respondent's age, gender, field of education and marital status.