Altruistic Behaviour, Life Satisfaction and Spirituality in Geriatric Population Living with Families and Old Age Homes.

The aim of the present study was to understand the relationship between, altruistic behavior, life satisfaction and coping in geriatric population and compare with those living with families and old age homes. 60 elderly persons (30 elderly were living with families and 30 were living in old age homes) with age 60 years or above were selected randomly in this study. Altruistic Personality Scale', Satisfaction with Life Scale, Subjective Happiness Scale and Spirituality Scale (Delaney, 2003) were administered on them individually. The correlations between the scores of different scales, were calculated to bring out the relationship of altruism with life satisfaction and spirituality. Mann Whitney test was used to compare the two groups of elderly living in different settings. The findings of this study revealed that, altruism (p=0.01) and spirituality (p=0.001) were positively related to life satisfaction in the elderly living in with their families. On the other hand spirituality (p=0.001) and subjective happiness (p=0.001) were significantly better in the elderly inmates. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]