Age Related Problems of the Elderly and Their Coping Mechanisms

Abstract

If we live longer period, then the existing commonly identified aspect is aging. For the last two decades the phenomenon of population ageing is becoming a major concern over the globe for the policy makers, for both developed and developing countries. Ageing of population is affected due to downward trends in fertility and mortality i.e. due to low birth rates coupled with long life expectancies. In India the size of the elderly population, i.e. persons above the age of 60 years is fast growing although it constituted only 7.4% of total population at the turn of the new millennium. The boundary of old age cannot be defined exactly because it does not have the same meaning in all societies. Government of India adopted ‘National Policy on older persons’ in January, 1999. The policy defines ‘senior citizen’ or ‘elderly’ as a person who is of age 60 years or above. There is a need of various concerns for the old age persons since they face multiple medical and psychological problems. There is an emerging need to pay greater attention to ageing-related issues because they are dependent. This research paper’s main aim is to discuss the challenges of the elderly persons. The two objectives are firstly, to study the problems of elderly and the second objective is to identify adjustment patterns, their well-being and the coping mechanism they use to adapt to the present changing society. The researcher used the secondary data and five detailed case studies.

Keywords: Elderly, Psychological Problems, Wellbeing, Violation & Coping Mechanism