Group Work Research On The Spiritual Lives Of "Garage Elders"

With the fast development of urbanization in China,a significant number of rural residents have lost their farmland.They have moved from rural buildings of two or more storeys to urban resettlement residential apartments.Some elders live in a garage apartment due to their health limitations and bad relationships with their children.We call these elders “garage elders”.Compared with focused empty nest elders and the elderly living alone,"garage elders" are rarely known by people.This article set Suzhou Wuzhong District A site “The sunshine in the garage ” project as the object of study.During the course of the project,10 "garage elders" were randomly selected as the survey object,and the relevant information of the elders were collected by means of interview and observation.We conducted a thorough investigation into the everyday lives of the elders’.This included their physical condition and their spiritual lives in order to understand their problems and demands.Social workers used professional skills to offer guidance to “garage elders”,who were encouraged to use self reflection and face their demands sincerely.Furthermore,social workers carried out specific group activities to support their mentality,help them build garage social hubs and enrich their spiritual lives.Finally,meticulous assessments based on the conclusions of the project were implemented.We hope that group work and exploratory research carried out on “garage elders” will be the reference of further spiritual life projects and will generate a wide awareness within society about “garage elders”...