The Future of Family Support for Thai Elderly: Views of the Populace

Future cohorts of older Thais will have fewer and more dispersed children. This will result in a continuing decline in coresidence with children that has been the lynchpin of the traditional familial system of old age support. The aim of the present study is to examine how parents who are approaching old age and their adult children view these changes and how they intend to deal them. A mixed method approach is used combining analysis of national survey data and open-ended interviews and discussions. The results reveal widespread awareness of reduced family size, increased migration, and lowered chances that aging parents live with or near adult children. Many near elderly parents express concerns about becoming a burden to their children and thus wish to maintain their independence as long as possible. At the same time, however, strong normative support persists for coresidence or proximal living arrangements and for children to be main care providers when the need eventually arises. Adult children generally proclaim willingness to live with and care for parents but it remains an open question if these intentions will be carried out especially if they have established themselves and their own conjugal families elsewhere. Thus a major disjuncture exists between norms and the changing empirical reality. Several potential solutions to meeting the challenges are assessed in the conclusions including relying on paid caregivers, using community based volunteers, and promoting economic activity of older persons.Higher Education Research Promotion and National Research University Project of Thailand, Office of the Higher Education Commission; The Amnuay-Samonsri Viravan Endowment for Thai Studies at the Center for Southeast Asian Studies, University of Michigan.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/100345/1/JPSS article.pd

Psychological well-being Asian style: The perspective of Thai elders

Psychological well-being is animportant aspect of life quality for olderadults. Asian elders may have a distinctlydifferent perspective from Westernersconcerning the meaning of psychologicalwell-being. Using qualitative researchmethods, this study focused on the views of Thai elders. In-depth interviews and focusgroup discussions were conducted with 67 Thaipeople aged 60 and over. Transcripts werecontent analyzed resulting in theidentification of five dimensions ofwell-being: harmony, interdependence,acceptance, respect and enjoyment. Whencompared to research in the United States, someof the dimensions of psychological well-beingwere distinct while others were overlapping. Implications are discussed in relation to thedevelopment of culturally-relevant measures ofwell-being.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/42983/1/10823_2004_Article_356817.pd

Older-age parents and the AIDS epidemic in Thailand: Changing impacts in the era of Anti-Retroviral Therapy

http://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/83332/1/Published_ESCAP_report.pd

Migration and Intergenerational Solidarity: Evidence from Rural Thailand

http://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/83330/1/UNFPA migration report.pd

Quality of life after spinal cord injury in Thai individuals: A mixed-methods study

Background: Patients with spinal cord injury (SCI) face various health-related difficulties. Physical limitations and health-related complications in individuals with SCI can lead to activity restrictions and lowering their quality of life (QoL). It is important to assess the QoL in population with SCI to gain more valuable insights into aspects of health-related QoL (HRQoL) that could play a key role in improving care for persons with SCI. Objective: To quantitatively measure the QoL in persons with SCI in Thailand and expand the results through qualitative investigation to provide meaning, context and depth of “how” and “why” they rated, defined and addressed their QoL in that way. Methods: The philosophical assumption of this study was set based on the post-positivist views using mixed-methods sequential explanatory design. The quantitative data were collected and analyzed in 101 Thai individuals with SCI using standardized Thai version of the Short Form Health Survey version 2 (SF-36v2), followed by the qualitative investigation of semi-structured interviews in 11 volunteers who participated in the SF-36v2 phase. Priority is given to quantitative data. The data integration occurred at the qualitative data collection through the data interpretation and discussion stage. Results: With regard to quantitative data, a recent study found a statistically significant difference (p<0.05) in four domains for male and three domains for the female when comparing the SF-36 Thai normative data with SF-36v2 SCI data. Qualitative data revealed that the most salient themes of HRQoL in individuals with SCI were “supporting factors toward QoL” and “driving force post injury”. The integration of the findings revealed that the qualitative data could individually explain and define QoL as well as support quantitative results. The connection of both findings indicated that the higher scores in psycho-social variables and lower scores in physical domains of SF-36v2 in Thai persons with SCI may be due to unique Thai family traditions and community values. Conclusion: The scores on SF-36v2 and the replies in the qualitative investigation of QoL themes of Thai individuals with SCI were similar to those of other research, but this study is unique in that it specifically represents the Thai socio-environmental-cultural aspects

The Future of Family Support for Thai Elderly: Views of the Populace

research team members. The team participated jointly in developing the project design and data collection. The author benefited from discussions with other team members during the preparation of this report. Special thanks go to Chanpen Saengtienchai for translating a substantial number of transcripts and summaries that form the basis of the qualitative data analysis. However, the author takes sole responsibility for the analysis and views expressed in the present report. The Future of Family Support for Thai Elderly 2 Future cohorts entering the old age span will have fewer and more dispersed children at the same time the steady decline in coresidence with children is certain to continue. These changes pose important challenges to the traditional family system of old age support and care defined mainly in terms of filial obligations of adult children and for which coresidence was a lynchpin. This study examines how near elderly parents and persons in their adult children’s ages view these changes and how they might to deal with them. A mixed method approach is used based on quantitative data from national surveys and qualitative data from open-ended interviews and discussions. The results reveal widespread awareness that family size has substantially declined and that increased migration related to education an