Participants' Attendance at a Health Promotion Program for Older Widows and Widowers

Abstract

Spousal bereavement can be disruptive to self-care and health promotion practices; therefore, older widow(er)s could benefit from health education classes, provided they are motivated to attend. Unfortunately, efforts to attract older adults to many established health promotion programs have not been very successful. Guided by the theory of reasoned action (TRA), we attempted to determine to what extent attendance at Pathfinders, a health promotion program for older widow(er)s, was explained by behavioral attitude (expected outcomes of attendance and how they were valued), subjective norm (beliefs about others' opinions about attending and motivation to comply with those beliefs), and behavioral intention to attend all the classes. Eighty-Four widow(er)s age 50 and over attended an average of 7.8 classes (out of 11 possible). Behavioral attitude and subjective norm combined to explain more than 25% of the variance in intention to attend all the classes, but the TRA model failed to predict actual class attendance. Alternatively, attendance was greater for those widowed more recently and who reported the classes overall as being more helpful. Although the participants reported that the location and time of the classes were convenient, a variety of unanticipated obstacles could have interfered with class attendance. The broad scope of the content could have adversely impacted attendance for some participants, particularly those widowed longer. Programs with the most relevant self-care content might maximize interest and participation.