The Effect of Time Commitment to Productive Activity on Subjective well-being among Young-Old Adults: Evidences from paid caregivers and volunteers of Home Care for Elderly in Shanghai

HONG MANJIANG

Publication

The Effect of Time Commitment to Productive Activity on Subjective well-being among Young-Old Adults: Evidences from paid caregivers and volunteers of Home Care for Elderly in Shanghai

HONG MANJIANG

Abstract

This study initially aimed at exploring the curvilinear effects of time commitment to productive activities in terms of care-giving employment and voluntary care-giving work on subjective well-being in terms of life satisfaction, subjective physical health status, subjective happiness, and depression among young-old caregivers (50-70 years old) in Shanghai Home Care for Elderly setting. Furthermore, the effects of age, gender, marital status, and education on the aforementioned curvilinear effects were also explored. Anonymous questionnaire survey was conducted, and 226 valid questionnaires were collected, within which there were 120 employed caregivers and 106 voluntary caregivers. Polynomial regression, multivariate linear regression, and loess method were respectively employed to explore the curvilinear relationships. The curvilinear relationships between time commitment and some dimensions of subjective well-being were obtained, and some suggestion was proposed to both home care organizations and voluntary organizations to promote the well-being of caregivers, and also to the policies and social work practice.