Capacity In Older People Research Articles

Attitudes toward the elderly among students of health care related studies at the University of Salamanca, Spain

This study uses a cross-sectional approach in terms of evaluating attitudes toward the elderly among health sciences students. The aim of this study was to measure attitudes among final year pregraduate students of seven health care careers. A cross-sectional study was conducted with final year students of medicine (M), occupational therapy (OT), physiotherapy (P), nursing (N), psychology (Ps), social work (Sw), and dentistry (D). The data was collected using the validated Spanish version of the questionnaire that uses the Aged Semantic Differential (ASD), a scale developed by Rosencrantz and colleagues. Additional information about sociodemographic characteristics of students was collected. A total of 472 valid questionnaires were collected; 54% of the students showed positive attitudes toward the elderly. Female students had more positive attitudes than male ones. The Ps and P students showed a high interest in choosing geriatrics as their speciality (36%), while only 16% of the medical students considered it among their career options. Pregraduate health care students' attitudes tend to be less positive concerning older people's capacity for self-determination. Therefore, it would be advisable to enhance continuous interaction among healthy aged people and students of the named specialities during their specific training. The fact that the N students had less positive attitudes toward the elderly, while they were also more likely to take action, and the fact that the Ps and Sw students had more positive attitudes might suggest a need to enhance and combine the approach to the care of the older people in nursing with the psychological and life course approaches.

The Effect of Aging on the Synchronization of Human Arm Movements to External Events

The aim of this study was to analyze the synchronization of cyclical arm movements to an external event and to determine age-related differences when the coupling strength between perception and action is manipulated. A group of young and a group of older subjects had to track a moving light travelling horizontally while manipulating a lever in the same direction (in-phase) or in the opposite direction (anti-phase). The results showed a performance decrease for both age groups in the anti-phase condition as compared to the in-phase condition, yet this decrease was more pronounced for the older persons. Interestingly, this age effect disappeared with practice. Most likely the observed age-related performance decrement was due to the difficulties encountered by older people to correct on line movements when the visual information needed was not directly accessible. Nevertheless, this study also highlights the capacity of older people to regain the performance loss through training.

LESSONS FROM THE OPEN UNIVERSITY: THIRD‐AGE LEARNING

Negative stereotypes about older people's capacity to engage in serious learning have, until recent times, been supported by psychological studies of age‐related cognitive functioning. Recent studies, however, reveal a wide variety of capability among those in the third age. Significant evidence of this is provided by the performance of 25 years of older students at the U.K. Open University. The proportion of undergraduate students over age 50 has risen to 14%, and the proportion over 60 has risen to 5%. Whilst their course choices, motivations, and methods of learning differ from younger students’, their academic performance compares favorably.