Læknablaðið : fylgirit - 01.03.1983, Page 243

Although it is well kncwn that old pecple are less educated than young pecple,
there are, between the age groups, no statistically significant differences in
the prcportion of respondents reporting themselves to have problems with bad
education. This surely indicates the relativity in the subjectively perceived
situation. Despite the fact that the educational level is decreasing with age
the perceived problem with bad education is not increasing simultaneously.
According to what from theoretical points of departure would be predicted, the
prcportion of respondents feeling useless is at peak in the highest age group.
Among the respondents 66-75 years old there is a prcportion of 26 per cent who
have reported the problem of uselessness as a problem of their own. Looking at
the other age groups it is noteworthy that the feelings of uselessness do not
follow age in a monotonous way. On the contrary there is one other specific age
category, 56-55 years, which have a proportion of respondents with feelings of
uselessness almost as high as in the highest age group.
Lack of meaningful activities is not a problem for the elderly, but rather a
problem for the young pecple. Among the respondents 15-25 years of age there
are 29 per cent who report themselves to have problems with lack of meaningful
activity. Arnong the oldest respondents the proportion of pecple with this prob-
lem is very lcw, 7.3 per cent. A rather high percentage of respondents with
this problem is again found among pecple aged 46-55.
The age group 46-55 years is also the one in which the problem with lack of
friends is most pronounced. In this age group there are 19.4 per cent of the
respondents who report themselves to have problems with lack of friends. Among
the oldest respondents this percentage is lower - 9.8 per cent.
Nöt surprisingly the problem with unenployment is a problem for the young respon-
dents. Among the youngest respondents 35.4 per cent state themselves to have
problems with unenployment, as conpared with 4.9 per cent among the oldest re-
spondents. Also, the problem with bad housing is a youth problem, not a problem
for the elderly.
A surprisingly high proportion of the respondents in this survey has reported
themselves to feel unsufficient. It is roughly a third of all respondents who
claim this to be a problem in their lives. When conparing the prcportion of
respondents with this problem in the various age groups the age group 46-55
years is again shcwn to be the one in which the problem has its peak. Theoreti-
cally this can be understood in terms of some kind of middle-age crisis.
Contrary to what might be expected from some theoretical points of departure,
the lowest prcportion of respondents with feelings of unsufficiency is found
among the oldest respondents.
With a couple of special methods, AID-analysis and regression analysis, we
have in this study tried to find out which sub-groups in the material run a
high risk to perceive soiae specific problem like e.g. fear of crime, loneliness
etc. The purpose has been to answer the question what caracterizes the pecple
who run a high risk to fear crime, problem with econony, problem with loneli-
ness etc. In short, these analyses have shown, that for most problems under
study, the respondent's age is not the most inportant part in the description
of such high risk groups. Other variables, like e.g. socio-economic status or
sex, are nuch more inportant. In a few cases the age variable is iirportant, but
only in one of these cases it has been possible to show that old age predicts a
high risk to perceive specific problem.
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