2nd International Conference on Management, Humanity and Economics (ICMHE'2013) August 25-26, 2013 Kuala Lumpur ()

Factors That May Influence The Time Spent With The Elderly In , Malaysia.

Maimon bt. Hussein1, Aw Yang Huey2, and Teh Boon Teck3

Chung Thye Phin, Garden and Greentown (Ipoh Echo, Abstract— Today’s hectic lifestyles have caused many people to November 1, 2010). This trend shows that their busy lifestyles spend lesser time with their elderly at home. This paper investigates have led some people to depend more on these nursing homes four explanatory factors namely family size, family ties, lifestyle and to help care for their elderly parents and relatives. the rise of technology to determine whether these factors are influencing the time spent with the elderly as perceived by the II. RESEARCH OBJECTIVE residents of Kinta Valley, . A questionnaire survey was randomly distributed in May 2013 and a total of 66 respondents were This paper intends to analyze the factors that are influencing interviewed. The Statistical Package for Social Science (SPSS) the time people spend with their elderly, as perceived by the version 21.0 was used to analyze the data. The F-value of 90.08 residents in Kinta Valley. The researcher uses four explanatory indicated that the relationships between the four explanatory factors variables that consist of family ties, family size, lifestyle and and the dependent variable are highly significant – F(4, 61) = 90.08, the rise of technology. p < 0.01. The results obtained from the Multivariate Statistics showed that technology contributes the most to the time spent with the elderly in Kinta Valley. As reported by other researchers, most of III. LITERATURE REVIEW the respondents in this survey believed that their families were closer Mancini & Blieszner (1989) reported that many studies have due to the rise of technology. been conducted regarding family ties and the well-being of elderly parents. Some of the researchers studied variables such Keywords—Elderly, Technology, Time Spent. as the number of children, the frequency of contact as well as how far do the adult children stay from their parents to I. INTRODUCTION ascertain significant relationships between family ties and the HE United Nations generally use 60 plus years to refer to well-being of elderly parents. Some of them argued that if Tthe elderly or older population. Due to our busy lifestyles, these children stay closer to their parents, it will increase their most of us will think of how much time we should spend parents’ health. However, these studies have failed to show with our elderly parents and close relatives; is it quantity time significant relationships. Meanwhile, Silverstein and Bengtson or quality time that matters? A report published by the Star (1991) discovered that it was the sense of emotional closeness newspaper on the 1st of April 2013, stated that an 83-year-old and family bonds that increase parents’ survival time. Hence, woman who was alone at home in Ipoh was assaulted by a the closeness of the affective ties between parents and their robber who has entered her house in the evening. Perhaps, if adult children can significantly affect the level of the parents’ she was not alone at home, this incident would not have well-being. happened. Most elderly people are lonely and they need Meanwhile, Wooding (1999) conducted a survey regarding someone to talk to and to care for them. According to Nancy employment and employee benefits. From his interview with 3 Chang, the queen of nursing homes in Ipoh, the idea of nursing brothers; Gladney, Will and Dick Darroh, Wooding has care for the elderly has gained acceptance by Ipohans. By concluded that the brothers could meet the challenges of 1994, she has opened homes providing care for the elderly at a running a successful personnel consulting business while rapid rate in the Kinta Valley area, namely in Pasir Puteh, fulfilling the demands of family and community involvements Pasir Pinji, Victoria Park, Bercham, Westpool Park, Jalan at the same time. The Darroh brothers said that they needed to be flexible in handling their business for the success of it and at the same time, for their family life to flourish. From their point of view, building relationships whether at work or at

home, is an important factor for them to be successful in life. 1Maimon bt. Hussein is with the Department of Town and Regional According to Dick Darroh whose children are studying in Planning at the Universiti Teknologi MARA (Perak), 32610 Bandar Baru Seri the universities, they made sure that they spend quality time Iskandar, Perak. with their families whenever they take some time off. The 2Aw Yang Huey is with the Department of Economics at the Universiti Teknologi MARA (Perak), 32610 Bandar Baru Seri Iskandar, Perak. Darroh brothers even invited their mother to join them in their 3Teh Boon Teck is with the Department of Journalism at the Universiti company. She is in charge of charities and keeps the business Tunku Abdul Rahman, Bandar Baru Barat, 31900 Kampar, Perak. firm focused on community service. From this survey, we can see that it is crucial to include the elderly in our daily life and

181 2nd International Conference on Management, Humanity and Economics (ICMHE'2013) August 25-26, 2013 Kuala Lumpur (Malaysia) building strong family ties would also be good for a successful closer due to technology. But 11 percent of the respondents family business. thought otherwise. They perceived that technology does In a research conducted by Patcharee et al. (2009), the nothing to bring closeness to their families. researchers have developed a surveying instrument that contained 61 items to assess the Thais’ familial support for IV. METHODOLOGY their elderly parents. When conducting tests on the family Research equation: support scale, they used both quantitative and qualitative methods. These methods include interviewing elderly parents TI = who stayed with their children and those who stayed at shelter whereby homes. By making comparisons of the results, they found that TI = Time spent with the elderly elderly parents who were living with their children had higher FT = Family Ties scores than those who were not. Thus, this research has FS = Family Size revealed that family support is essential and remains the major LS = Lifestyle resource of support for elderly parents in Thailand. TH = Rise of Technology David Heitz (2009) reported in the Quad-City Times that = Error term there is a growing number of Americans who invited their Research Hypotheses: parents to move in with them. The United States Census figures showed that the percentage of elderly parents living In this research, four models of alternative hypotheses have with their children has increased by 67 percent in 2007 been developed, as follows. compared to the year 2000. These moves not only decrease the H1: There is a relationship between family ties and the cost of living for the elderly but they can also get to spend perception of time spent with the elderly. quality time with their grandchildren. Harriett Young of H2: There is a relationship between family size and the Davenport who has her mother-in-law staying with her family perception of time spent with the elderly. said adjustments have to be made so that they can work H3: There is a relationship between lifestyle and the together as a family. She added that it was fun having her perception of time spent with the elderly. mother-in-law around and her presence was greatly beneficial H4: There is a relationship between the rise of technology to her family. and the perception of time spent with the elderly. A qualitative study conducted by Assoc. Prof. Dr. Norizan This research has utilized the cluster or area random Abdul Ghani et al. (2012) in Bachok, Kelantan investigated sampling method. Under the area random sampling method, factors that are influencing children’s negligence towards the researcher divides the population into clusters along elderly parents. This study disclosed that health issues (19%) geographic boundaries and then randomly samples the clusters. are the major factor of abandonment followed by workaholic The sampling size for this research was set at 66. The data was children (17%) as the second highest factor. This study has analyzed using the Statistical Package for Social Science also revealed that most children who are working showed less (SPSS) 21.0. concern towards their elderly parents. They rarely visit them at their hometown, citing that they have been busy with work V. RESULTS related matters as their reasons. Based on the results listed in Table 1, the multiple linear Meanwhile, in an investigation regarding time allocated for regressions equation will be as follows: elderly parents by urban children in Pune, Maharashtra, TI = 0.928 - 0.039FS - 0.014FT - 0.047LS + 0.836TH Manasi (2011) revealed that there are certain factors which are The relationships between FS and TI, FT and TI, LS and TI significantly associated to the time spent with parents. Some of are all in a negative manner. However, the relationship the factors studied in this study include age, presence of between TH and TI is in positive manner. In terms of family siblings in household and monetary support given to parents. size (FS), the negative relationship would indicate that the Manasi has applied micro-level primary data in his research smaller the family size, the more time the adult children can and discovered that parents who were strong sources of spend with their elderly parents or close relatives. As for support for their sons will in return receive more time from family ties (FT), it shows that even in a broken family, the their sons. adult children will still find the time to spend with their elderly In a study by B. Veenhof et al. (2008), it was revealed that parents and care for them. This shows that the practice of filial Canadians - in urban or rural areas - value the Internet usage. piety is still relevant and exists among the people in Kinta Both senior citizens and young adults use the Internet for Valley. The data has also revealed that a less hectic lifestyle socializing and communicating with relatives and friends. will contribute to more time to spend with the elderly. They found that the young adults are more socially engaged Meanwhile, the equation above shows that the rise of online. Internet usage not only helped them to keep up with technology (TH) and time spent (TI) is positively related. This family and friends but also increases their number of friends. indicates that the higher use of technology will increase the In other words, technology helps keep family connected. Alex time spent with the elderly people. A closer look at the t- (2012) in his report of a survey involving 2252 individuals values indicates that out of these four explanatory variables; regarding society and relationships showed that 25 percent of only technology (TH) has greatly contributed to the perception the respondents completely agreed that their families were

182 2nd International Conference on Management, Humanity and Economics (ICMHE'2013) August 25-26, 2013 Kuala Lumpur (Malaysia) of time spent with the elderly in Kinta Valley. TH is Valley. This finding is supported by Tracy Kennedy et al. statistically significant in this model. (2008) in a national survey that reported that technology can Table I below shows the multiple linear regressions. bring more closeness to the majority of American adults’ family life than before. Therefore, we can say that advances in TABLE I technology aren’t so bad after all. Only a handful of people A COEFFICIENTS think that technology has a negative impact on family Model Unstandardized Standardized T Sig. closeness. Coefficients Coefficients B Std. Beta Error REFERENCES C .928 .396 2.343 .022 [1] Walker C. Wooding, Jr., “Flexibility of family business allows success FS -.039 .048 -.041 -.823 .414 on all fronts,” Houston Business Journal, week of Jan 1-7, pp. 21–28, 1999. 1 FT -.014 .079 -.009 -.180 .858 [2] Ryan A. K., Willits F. K., “Family ties, physical health and LS -.047 .075 -.033 -.622 .536 psychological well-being,” Journal of Aging and Health, vol. 19, issue TH .836 .047 .909 17.890 .000 6, pp. 907–920, 2007. a. Dependent Variable: TI [3] Patcharee Komjakraphan, Sang-arun Isalamalai, Umaporn **Level of significant (P < 0.05) Boonyasopun, Joanne K. Schneider, “Development of the Thai family support scale for elderly parents,” Thai Journal of Nursing Research, TABLE II vol. 1, issue 13, pp. 118-132, 2009. MODEL SUMMARY [4] David Heitz, “Elderly parents increasingly moving in with their Model R R Adjusted Std. Error children,” Quad-City Times, April 4, 2009. Square R Square of the [5] B. Veenhof, B. Wellman, C. Quell, B. Hogan, “How Canadian Use of Estimate the Internet Affects Social Life and Civic Participation,” Connectedness 1 .925a .855 .846 .22898 Series. Science, Innovation and Electronic Information Division, 2008. ISBN: 978-1-100-10914-5

[6] Alex,www.linkivity.com/articles/technology-helps-keep-families- connected-4031.html, 2012. TABLE III ANOVA [7] Norizan Abdul Ghani, Wan Ibrahim Wan Ahmad, Nik Nur Salinawati ANOVAA Azmi, Che Siti Nur Adliza Mahmud, “Children’s negligence towards Model Sum of Df Mean F Sig. elderly parents in Bachok, Kelantan, Malaysia,” British Journal of Squares Square Social Science, vol. 1, issue 3, pp. 45-54, Dec. 2012. Regression 18.893 4 4.723 90.080 .000b [8] Manasi Bawdekar International Institute for Population Sciences, Do 1 Residual 3.198 61 .052 Urban Children Give Time To Their Elderly Parents? Website: paa2011.princeton.edu/papers/110243 Total 22.091 65 [9] Health-United Nations Statistics Division, Website: a. Dependent Variable: TI unstats.un.org/unsd/default.htm b. Predictors: (Constant), FT, FS, LS, TH [10] Barry Wellman, Aaron Smith, Amy Wells, Tracy Kennedy, “Network Families,” Families, Mobile, New Media Ecology, 2008. In this study, the value of R2 obtained is 0.855, as shown in Table II. This means that 85.5% of the variation in the dependent variable which is the perception of time spent with the elderly can be explained by the variations in the independent variables which are family ties, family size, lifestyle and rise in technology. Meanwhile, the remaining 14.5% of the dependent variable (TI) can be explained by other factors which were not included in the regression model, such as monetary support as reported by Manasi (2011). Based on the results obtained in this study, the R value is 0.925. This explains that the dependent variable and the independent variables are closely related to each other. The F-statistic was used to test whether all the independent variables are significant towards the dependent variable. To support this, the p-value must be less than 0.01, because the researcher uses a 99% confidence interval. The F-value of 90.08 as seen in Table 3 supports that the relationship is highly significant – F(4, 61) = 90.08, p < 0.01. Thus, we can conclude that the overall model is significant.

VI. CONCLUSION Based on the individual regression coefficients (their corresponding p-value) of each explanatory variable, it was found that technology is statistically significant and contributes to the perception of time spent with the elderly in Kinta

183