Abuse of the Frail Elderly

Paper Summary:

This paper investigates the abuse of the frail elderly by family care givers. The objectives of the proposed research study were to gain insights into factors implicated in the development and perpetuation of such abuse, identify those causal factors that may be amenable to intervention, and recommend policies and programs, where applicable, to reduce the incidence of such abuse.

From the Paper:

"The increasing awareness that some elderly persons are physically abused and neglected by family members has been accompanied by a widespread assumption about elder abuse: that it is inflicted by well meaning individuals, often the adult children of victims, who are pushed over the edge by the stress of caring for a frail, dependent old person. According to Pillemer & Finkelhor (1989), the falsity of that assumption was revealed by findings that relatively well-functioning elderly people were found to usually be the victims of abuse, which is often inflicted by emotionally disturbed or violent family members. A typical abuser was found to be a person who depends on the victim for money, transportation, housing and household repairs. Elderly victims were no more disabled or dependent on their abusers than were comparison subjects on their relatives. Abusers, however, were much more likely than relatives in the comparison group to have been arrested, hospitalized for a psychiatric disorder, involved in violent behavior outside the family, or limited by a physical problem (Pillemer & Finkelhor, 1989). The generalizations of these findings has been challenged by more recent studies (Saad, Hartman, Kurian, Graham, Wilcock, & Ballard, 1995)."

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