獨居 老人의 性에 관한 態度 硏究

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to review the sexual life and attitude of the elderly living alone. The results of this study can be summarized as follows; First, the average period for which the subject elderly had lived alone was 11.19 years, while an elderly lived alone for 39 years. Such a finding suggests that living alone must be one of the poorest living conditions for the elderly. Second, 57.6% of the subject elderly living alone answered that they had not wanted to marry again, while 34.8% of them responded that they could not marry again because of their grown-up children's opposition, and 26.1% of them answered that they could not marry again due to the financial problems. 80.6% of the female elderly living alone said that they did not want to marry again anyway, which suggests that in the patriarchical society, women have sacrificed their life for their families and therefore, that they would not like to reexperience an oppressed life. In other words, the female elderly living alone seem to believe that remarriage would not allow to live a happy life. Third, 47.5% of the subject elderly living alone answered that they had a female friend, while 52.5% of them said that they had no female friend. Among the elderly who said that they had no female friend, 58.1% wanted to have a female friend but hesitated to do so due to various reasons. Such a finding suggests that a favorable social atmosphere needs to be created to encourage the lonely elderly to make friends with the other sex and thereby, be relieved of the sense of loneliness and alienation. As one of the methods, the community welfare centers are requested to design a program whereby the lonely elderly could make friends with the other sex. Fourth, as a result of analyzing the sexual life of the subject elderly, it was found that 28.8% of them were enjoying sex, while 71.2% were not. The frequency of the sex was 2.25 times per month on average, and 58.8% of them were making love with their friends. On the other hand, 76.5% of the elderly making love with the other sex were aged between 65 and 70, and some elderly aged around 80 were having sex. Fifth, regardless whether they had sex or not, 62.1% of the elderly living alone desired to have a sexual life. 47.2% of them were actually having sex, while 52.8% of them did not realize their sexual desire. Sixth, when the elderly who were enjoying the sexual life could not find their sex partners, 38.5% of them tried to forget about their sexual desire by doing exercise, while 53.6% of them were oppressing their sexual desire in other ways. On the other hand, 62.9% of the female elderly did not feel a sexual desire, which suggests that they had grown up in a social culture forcing them to keep their chastity for the life of them. Because such a social value system is internalized in them, they tend to give up sexual life when their husbands pass away. Seventh, as a result of analyzing the elderly's attitude towards sex, it was found that the item 'attitude towards sex' scored 20.2, while the item 'elderly's attitude towards sex' scored 26.90. Such results represent that the elderly are positive towards sex. On the other hand, their 'desire of sex' scored only 19.85, which means that their sexual desire is not much high. In other words, our elderly's sexual desire without their spouses is not much strong. Moreover, the item 'relation between life and sex' scored 14.29, which suggests that elderly's life or happiness is not much affected by sex. In other words, the sexual life does not have much effect on our elderly's sense of happiness, and therefore, elderly's satisfaction with life is affected by other variables than the sexual life. The item 'social desire' scored 14.29, which means that our elderly are not much desirous of the social environment allowing them to have sexual life. Summing up, our elderly have a positive attitude towards sex, but they tend to distance themselves from the actual sex. Eighth, in terms of three top priorities among their social desires, 31.6% of them counted 'job for solving their financial problems', 26.9% of them wanted to be checked regularly for their health, and 24.0% of them desired to participate in the recreation programs for the elderly living alone. Such findings suggests that the elderly's problems involve financial difficulty, poor health and sense of alienation. In particular, since elderly's sense of loneliness and alienation tend to be caused by severation of human relationship, some policies should be designed to help them participate in the community programs. Ninth, as a result of analyzing what our elderly need most, it was found that 39.7% of them wanted to have their health problems solved, 29.3% wanted to have their financial problems solved, and 15.3% of them wanted to be relieved of their sense of alienation. 10.3% of them wanted to enjoy a recreational life, and 3.4% of them wanted to enjoy a sexual life. As shown from these data, most of the elderly face these or other health problems. Thus, the variable affecting our elderly's life must be 'health', and therefore, when their physical conditions have been improved, their sense of well-being will be enhanced. Such a finding suggests that it is necessary to expand the free-of-charge physical treatment facilities.