Future time perspective and food habits of the aged

Abstract

The primary objective of this research was an exploration of the role of future time perspective in the choice of food use patterns or the maintenance of life-long food habits of a sample of people over sixty years old. A second objective was to explore and identify the structural context of a negative or positive future time perspective as it related to age-appropriate food use patterns and dietary adequacy. The theoretical context for this exploratory research was symbolic interactionism specifically the Meadian theory of time as a process. The concern was aged people's choice of food use patterns (the present) as a reflection of structural conditions (the past) and the perception of a negative or positive future. A sample of 201 aged people were examined to explore the research problem. The methodology used was the constant comparative method--an inductive method of discovering theory. The method required qualitative and quantitative data from a variety of research techniques. The analysis of data from observations, informal and formal interviews, documents, and a survey revealed three general ways in which the sample of people over age sixty related to food. These were (1) positive changes in food habits; (2) maintenance of life-long food habits; and (3) negative changes in food habits. Future time perspective was found to be correlated with these food use patterns; that is, a positive future time perspective was more likely to be associated with positive changes in food habits while a negative future time perspective was more likely to correlate with negative food habit changes. Examination of the structural context, however, revealed four ways in which future time perspective and age-appropriate food use patterns were related within unique structural contexts: (1) a positive future time perspective was associated with positive changes in food habits; (2) maintenance of life-long food habits was not associated with a negative or positive future time perspective; (3) a negative future time perspective was associated with positive changes in food habits; and (4) a negative future time perspective was associated with negative changes in food habits...