Impact of adult migration on psychological wellbeing of rural elderly

Dr.Prema B.Patil

Volume : VI, Issue : VIII, August - 2016

Impact of adult migration on psychological wellbeing of rural elderly

Dr. Prema B. Patil

Abstract :

The ageing population and massive rural–to–urban migration poses major challenge to elderly care in rural areas as the traditional method of inter–generational elderly support is under considerable pressure. This paper examines the impact of migration of adult children on the psychological well–being of rural elderly. The study was carried out in Utnal village of Vijayapur district and Dadanatti, Kajjidoni and Sunag tanda of Bagalkot district of Karnataka. The total sample comprised of 102 elderly persons aged 65 years and above whose adult children had migrated to other places other than their place of origin. The scale developed and standardized by Sisodia,D.S. and Choudhary,P. was used to measure the psychological well–being of rural elderly. The scale consists of five areas namely satisfaction, efficiency, sociability, mental health and interpersonal relations with 10 items in each area. The results revealed that 53.92 percent of the respondents had low level of psychological well being leading to augmented feelings of loneliness and unhappiness.