Krystle Balhan Archibald

SPIKE OF EXCELLENCE IN GENDER STUDIES

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•Gender Studies•Goals

•Gain advanced theoretical and clinical knowledge in gender studies

•Skill proficiency in psychological practice with women and men

•Research in gender studies

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SPIKE of Excellence

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• Didactic• Graduate Certificate in Women’s Studies• Instruction of Psychology of Gender, Psychological

Perspectives on the Female Experience, Introduction to Women’s Studies, and Counseling Diverse Populations - Gender and Ethnicity

• Clinical• Feminist Interpersonal Process Therapy• Men’s issues rotation

• Research/Writing• Self-Esteem and Widowhood: A Qualitative Study of

Older Women• Symposium (submitted): Innovative Psychological

Services for College Men: The Men’s Center Approach

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SPIKE continued3

“IT’S A WHOLE NEW WORLD”: SELF-ESTEEM AND

WIDOWHOOD IN OLDER WOMEN IN A RETIREMENT

COMMUNITY

Krystle Balhan Archibald

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• Widowhood is potentially most disruptive transition of a woman’s life (Bradsher, 2001)

• ½ of women 65+ are widows (Hanson & Hayslip, 2000)

• Literature reviewed and current study focus on widowhood in the context of heterosexual marriage

5Introduction

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• Loss of spouse (Fry,

2001)

• Loss of status (e.g., van

den Hoonaard, 2005)

• Loss of social networks (e.g., Bennett,

2005)

• Loss of self-esteem (e.g., Walters & Charles, 1999)

Widowhood as Layers of Loss

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• Drops in self-esteem are not automatically indicated in widowhood (Fry, 2001)

• Serves as buffer against depression and stressors (Aneshensel, Botticello, & Yamamoto-Mitani,

2004)

Benefit of Self-Esteem in Widowhood

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• Understand the lived experiences of older widowed women with their self-esteem

13Purpose of the Current Study

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•How do older widowed women experience their self-esteem?•How, if at all, is the women’s self-esteem

experience in the context of widowhood different from the context of “wife?”

•From where do older women derive their self-esteem in widowhood?

•What meaning does self-esteem hold for older women in widowhood?

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Research Questions

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•13 Women•Reside in Green Valley, AZ

•11 full-time; 2 “snowbirds”

15Methods - Participants

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Variable Mean Standard Deviation

Age (years) 72 6.24

Years as widows 3.13 3.22

Years married 41.49 13.72

Years of education 16.54 1.76

Descriptive Statistics

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•Demographic Questionnaire•Semi-structured interviews

•1 time, face-to-face•Approx. 45 minutes•Audio-recorded

•Transcript Review•Participant reviewed her own transcript for

accuracy

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Methods - Procedure12

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•Extent to which we can trust the results and conclusions•Researcher’s journal

•Peer examination

•Member-checking

17Trustworthiness

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•Constant Comparative Analysis (Strauss & Corbin, 1990)

•Inductive Approach•Codes developed from the data, not a priori

•Step 1: Interviews and Transcripts•Step 2: Open Coding•Step 3: Finding Categories Among Codes•Step 4: Analyses of Themes and Other

Variables

18Analyses

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•Data redundancy•Purposive sampling•Researcher’s journal•Peer examiner

Saturation

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ANALYSES & THEMES

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4 Themes

•The Widowhood Experience•Self-Esteem•Relationships•Independence

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The Widowhood Experience

•It’s a whole new world•Fog•Being alone•Life goes on

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It’s a whole new world

•As I said, it’s a whole new world. Nothing is the same...That was a big turning point. Such a little thing, but it was like cold water in my face. Things will never be the same. Not that they can’t be good, but they’ll never be the same. (Sarah)

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Fog

•So it was like [deep breath in], you know you’re kind of, well, like in a fog, not really accepting it. (Janet)

Being alone

•“I’m alone and it’s so sad, and all that. I have moments that you know, I feel alone.” (Marie)

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Life goes on

•“It is not the end of your life. It’s the beginning, sort of, of a new life, I guess.” (Loretta)

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Self-Esteem

•Confidence & Positivity•Sources

•Women & widows•Friendships•Family•Faith•Leisure activities

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Confidence and Positivity

• I think self-esteem is confidence in your ability to um do things adequately and appropriately. (Melissa)

•“Feeling good about yourself, feeling you’re OK.” (June)

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Sources of Self-Esteem• Women: Well, women. Women are marvelous. And I

never really had the connection that I had before this happened, because it’s different. (Sarah)

• Friendships: Well, my friends have been just wonderful. My friends have wined and dined me, taken me places, done all kinds of things with me, come and stayed with me. (Samantha)

• Family: my family is very important, even though they’re not here. (Patty)

• Faith: And now I feel really good about being there, and being involved in the activities at the church, so that’s been a real big help for me. Just to be closer to people that believe the same way that I do. (Joy)

• Leisure: Bridge, Osher Lifelong Learning Institute

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Relationships•Need to extend

yourself•Exclusion from

couples

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Exclusion from couples

•Well, I think they [other people] have to know that in our society, widowhood means you cannot associate with, you will be rejected by married couples. Uh, you just have to understand that our society does not accept widows or divorcees with married couples. (Blythe)

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Independence

•Preparation for widowhood•Independence during marriage

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Preparation for widowhood

•But I do know a lot of women also, that don’t know mechanics of uh you know how to take care of the car. They need to be very involved in the nuts and bolts of what it takes to live. But I think that’s the preparation that all women of our age need to do. (Sarah)

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Independence during marriage• I’ve always done that, even through my married life.

I went to a lot of things by myself, so I was kind of primed for it. (June)

• I have been an independent person who supervised a large number of employees. Have lived alone before and traveled a lot by myself, so most of the things I’m dealing with now aren’t the first time I’ve ever dealt with them. But I I definitely think that the fact that I have done a lot of things on my own in life and had a responsible job and did uh uh, have traveled and done a lot of things on my own helps me to know that I can get along. (Samantha)

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DISCUSSION

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•Development and identity formation in old age (Chapman, 2004; Ryff, 1991)

•Continuity: stable self-esteem sources, independence•Brandtstädter and Greve (1994)

•Change: being alone, relationships, exclusion

Essence: Constructing Multiple Identities

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Considering Demographics

•Physical Health• Independently living women• Increased physical health correlated with higher self-esteem

(Dionigi & Cannon, 2009)

•SES and Education• High school+; retirement community• Low SES related to increased morbidity/mortality for mental

health disorders (Anderson & Armstead, 1995)

•Ethnicity• Self-identified Caucasion, Euro-American• Racial discrimination related to negative mental health

consequences (Williams, Lavizzo-Mournay, & Warren, 1994)

Implications and Future Directions

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•Implications for clinicians•Positive psychology•Feminist psychology

•Future directions•Health information•Heterogeneous

sample

QUESTIONS?