Research On Group Work Intervening In The Spiritual Comfort Of Rural Empty-nest Elderly ——Take T Village In Gansu Province As An Example

With the rapid development of China’s economy and change in population,the gap between the development in urban and rural areas has gradually expanded.Under the wave of urbanization,it has become the norm for young and middle-aged people from rural areas to move to cities.As a result,the elderly people who were left behind gradually formed a huge group of rural empty-nesters.Research shows that most of the income of the empty-nest elderly people in rural areas comes from the support of their sons or daughters,or from their retirement pensions.Although the basic needs of the elderly are met,their emotional needs are far from being met,which can easily lead to negative emotions such as loneliness.Current academic research on the rural empty-nest elderly primarily focuses on the daily elderly care.The existing research on the emotional support for the rural emptynest elderly is relatively scarce.Based on the Social support theory and Maslow’s hierarchy of needs theory,this paper took T Village in Gansu Province as the research site.With the cooperation of the village committee of T Village,the researcher collected data by means of creating questionnaires,making interviews,and conducting field observations to identify the living and emotional needs and causes of these needs.The study provided practical intervention for the emotional needs of the elderly empty-nesters.During the intervention,the social work teams conducted many stages of group activities.The design of these activities fully reflected the value of the social work.These activities aimed to improve the elderly people’s social interaction ability,build peer support network,enhance the life perceptiveness of the empty-nesters,relieve their feelings of loneliness,and promote their positive emotions.This paper used the Memorial University of Newfoundland Scale Of Happiness and the UCLA Loneliness Scale,and pre-and post-test methods to evaluate the effectiveness of this group work.The results showed that the work of peer support groups enriched the mutual assistance and support network of empty nesters,improved their mental emptiness,developed their interpersonal skills,made them gain a sense of belongings from their peer groups,reduced the risk of loneliness,therefore,increased their sense of well-being.