Epidemiology of Psychological Distress in a Chinese Aging Population

点击翻译按钮获取中文摘要

This goal of our project is to conduct an epidemiological study to elucidate the relationship between culture factors and psychological wellbeing in Chinese older adults. More specifically, we will examine the trajectory of psychological wellbeing in Chinese older adults, to quantify the relation between normative responsibilities with their psychological wellbeing, to quantify the degree of influence to which normative responsibilities influences health-related factors associated with psychological wellbeing, and to examine the gender differences. Our secondary aims are to explore the feasibilities of testing the inter-relations between subjective and physiological measures of psychological wellbeing; and to explore the socio-cultural context in the normative responsibilities. Chinese aging population is increasing rapidly in US and globally. However, there are marked health disparities, especially surround the issues of psychological wellbeing, suicide, violence and elder mistreatment (elder abuse, neglect, financial exploitation and self-neglect). In addition, there are linguistic and cultural complexities and nuances when studying these issues. Moreover, there has been inadequate grass-root support necessary to empower and enable the Chinese communities to fully participate in the research process as equal partners on culturally sensitive issues. Accordingly, we will build on our prior community-based participatory research to quantify the mechanisms between important cultural factors and the trajectory of psychological wellbeing in Chinese older adults. In this application, a culturally capable principal investigator and a multi-institutional interdisciplinary team will build on our prior efforts to collaborate with Chinese community organizations. The findings from this proposal could inform health care professionals, researcher, community, and policy makers to identify risk/protective factors, better understand disease pathway, inform future prevention and intervention studies, and inform the practice and policy to improve psychological wellbeing in Chinese older adults.