Ageing Research and Geriatric Medicine

Biography

Wang Gang, Associate Professor and elderly services and management professional leaders of Institute of Elderly Man­agement, Jiangsu Vocational Institute of Commerce; PhD of School of Psychology, Nanjing Normal University Nanjing, Ji­angsu, China. Mainly engaged in teaching and research work in the fields of geriatric psychology and aged care services. Once obtained chinese outstanding scholars of gerontology and Ex­cellent elderly scholars in Jiangsu Province. As a member of the Committee of Gerontology of the Chinese Psychological Association and the Senior Psychology Committee of China Mental Health Association.

Abstract

Attitudes toward own aging can effectively predict physical and mental health and the degree of successful aging among the elderly. With age, attitudes to aging in the elderly are influenced by internal factors (including health status, cognitive function and personality characteristics) and external factors (including social environment and social support). This study used the 2014 China Longitudinal Aging Social Survey (CLASS) to explore the relationship between the activities of daily living, cognitive function, social support, and attitudes toward own aging. After omitting the missing values of the key variables, 5,430 valid samples were obtained, and a structural equation model was established using Mplus7.0 to test the mediating effect. The results showed that Pearson correlations were performed between the total scores on each scale, and the activities of daily living were significantly negatively correlated with cognitive function and social support; significant positive correlations were positively correlated with attitudes toward own aging. Cognitive function was significantly positively correlated with social support but significantly negatively correlated with attitude toward own aging; social support was significantly negatively correlated with attitude toward own aging. The conformity indicators of the validation models for each measurement model (activity of daily living, cognitive function, social support, attitude toward own aging) were robust: RMSEA=0.034; CFI=0.976, TLI=0.958. According to the model, the activities of daily living among the elderly can directly predict attitudes toward own aging and can indirectly predict attitudes toward own aging through cognitive function and social support. It is also possible that a chain-mediated role occurs through cognitive function and social support; that is, the negative activities of daily living predict cognitive function, cognitive function predicts social support positively, and inversely predicts attitude toward own aging.