THE RELATIONAL NATURE OF CHILDREN’S PERCEPTIONS OF PARENTAL AGING: FINDINGS FROM A JAPANESE SAMPLE

摘要

Although gerontological research has directed close attention to the components of people’s views on aging in general, relatively little is known about how people perceive the aging of their family members, such as parents, as well as psychosocial correlates of such perceptions. In this study, from a social constructionist perspective, which presumes that individuals’ perceptions are shaped through interactions with others, we sought to identify whether and how Japanese adult children’s perceptions of parental aging are linked with the nature of the ties that they have built with their parents. Specifically, we focused on how much adult children perceived their parents as “young” for their age, and examined the association between such perceptions and structural (e.g., geographical proximity, contact frequency) and functional (e.g., exchanges of different forms of support) aspects of the relationship with parents. Using online survey data from 1,010 Japanese adult children with at least one living parent aged 65 or older, we conducted regression analysis, which revealed that children were more likely to perceive their parents as “young” for their age when finding it easier to self-disclose to parents; when having received greater amounts of tangible aid from parents; and when having provided fewer amounts of such aid for parents. Note that these results were obtained while controlling for parents’ age and age disparity between parents and children. Our findings suggest that functional rather than structural aspects of parent-child relationships matter for Japanese adult children’s perceptions of parental aging.