SOCIAL NETWORK ANALYSIS AND THE DIFFERENTIAL UTILIZATION OF LONG-TERM CARE SERVICES BY OLDER PEOPLE: A METHODOLOGICAL PARADIGM.

摘要

Drawing upon previous research about long-term care service utilization and social network analysis, a conceptual framework is developed and presented that identifies those social network factors appearing to have the greatest potential impact upon the differential utilization of long-term care services by older persons. Using this framework, and a research methodology that employed the techniques of social network analysis, an exploratory study was conducted which examined the social network factors associated with the differential utilization of formal long-term care services by older persons living in two counties of northwestern Florida.;The results of the exploratory study have important implications for formal providers of long-term care services and for persons who are involved with the development of long-term care social policy. In addition to those programs and policy implications, the study demonstrates that despite certain methodological weaknesses, the method of social network analysis developed for this study can be a valuable research tool for adding to present knowledge about long-term care service utilization. Such information can be critical for the future development of policy and programs concerned with meeting the long-term care needs of older persons.;Differences were found to exist between the study's two subject samples with regard to several of the social network factors that were examined. The nature of those differences suggest that the type of formal long-term care services used by the older persons in the study, may have, in part, been influenced by certain structural qualities of the social networks by those persons, by certain attitudes and values held by those persons with regard to their networks, and by the nature and quality of the relationships that existed between those persons and individual members of their networks.