Age and Ageing Advance Access originally published online on March 26, 2007
Age and Ageing 2007 36(3):310-315; doi:10.1093/ageing/afm023
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Quality of life among older people with poor functioning. The influence of perceived control over life
1 Department of Primary Care and Population Sciences, University College London, Hampstead Campus, Rowland Hill Street, London NW3 2PF, UK
2 Department of Epidemiology, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, Keppel Street, London, WC1E 7HT, UK
Address correspondence to: A. Bowling. Tel: +44(0) 2077940500; Fax: +44 (0)2077941224. Email a.bowling{at}ucl.ac.uk
Objective: to investigate the apparently incongruous coupling of poor physical functioning with high QoL.
Study design and setting: face-to-face interview survey of random sample of 999 people aged 65+ across Britain.
Results: twenty-one per cent of respondents reported fairly to very severe levels of functional difficulty, and 62% of these rated their QoL as ‘good’. Better self-rated health, lower burden of chronic disease, not having fallen, higher social engagement and higher levels of perceivd control ver life, distinguished between people who had difficulties with physical functioning and who perceived their QoL to be ‘good’, rather than ‘not good’. The open-ended survey responses broadly supported the quantitative findings.
Conclusion: people with difficulties with physical functioning, who perceived their QoL to be ‘not good’, as opposed to ‘good’, were adversely affected by a higher burden of disease and having fewer socio-psychological resources to help them to cope effectively.
Keywords: physical functioning, quality of life, health status, elderly, old age, control
Received 19 May 2006; accepted in revised form 25 January 2007.
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