노년여성과 남성의 내 외 통제성 비교연구 = The Relationship between Locus of Control and the Selected Personal Variables as Perceived by Korean Female Older Adults

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

The research is a comparative study of the relationship between selected personal demographic variables and locus of control among male and female older adults.
We are more aware of the demographic and the aging process than we have been in any other period in history. In considering the expansion of elderly populations and the average duration of life, the older generation is increasingly confronted with a variety of threats to their mental, social, emotional, and spiritual well-being. The above threats would seem to lead to a potential loss of perceived control which, in turn, would be related to mental health.
In the study, 152 male elderly and 145 female elderly residing in Seoul, Korea was compared on the 3 dimensions of locus of control and assigned personal variables,
Therefore, the purpose of the research was (1) to examine the characteristics of subjects on the independent variables ; (2) to examine the relationship between the independent variables and each dimension of locus of control ; (3) to determine the proportion of variance in the respective of locus of control which is accounted for by the respective independent variables ; (4) to examine whether a significant difference between the respective independent variables and locus of control has ; (5) to determine the combination of variables which is the most successful in explaining the variance in the locus of control.
Findings from this study support the following conclusions :
1. There were a statistically significant relationship between each dimension of locus of control and the independent variables.
2. The male subjects showed a low scores of personal control. It means male older adults expressed internally control their lives comparing to female older adults in the perspective of personal control.
3. The female elderly exhibited a higher level of system control than the male elderly.
4. In the level of control ideology, female subject exhibited a higher scores than male subjects. It suggested that female were less aware of choics and less wiling to take responsibility for their decisions. Most female subjects thought that they couldn't control most people in society posses.
5. For the male subjects, the three dimensions, 'system control', 'personal control', and 'control ideology' were best predicted by 'marriage life', 'Personal control' an 'control ideology' for the famel subjects were best predicted by 'marriage life', while 'system control' was best predicetd by 'self-assessed health'.
The Korean male subjects felt more in control of their lives than did the female Korean subjects. Most female elderly in Korea derived their identity form men. Likewise, for the female Korean elderly, past negative reinforcement experiences tend to result in a consistent belief system that leads to an external locus of control. In trying to gain an undertanding of psychological impact of adjustment to aging people, especially, for female older adults, it may be very important to clarify the relationship between locus of control and the psychosocial variables.
As Porter(1978)found, married men were more internally controlled than married women in the relationship between locus of control and attitudes toward the women's liberation movements.Applying this results to the future research, more detailed examination need in order to investigate how much marriage-related variables influence, either positively or negatively, not only societal functioning but also the level of locus of control and whether there are differences between either single women and single men : or between single women and married men.
Therefore, in order to improve the psychological will-being in later life, especially, for the female older adults, those results should be the focus of concerns for the political decision makers, the familities, social care givers and professional facilities attempting to meet the needs of older adults in Korea.