ain shams university V:39 part 1. 2015

Abstract

This study aimed at identifying the level of psychological depression among the elder male and female persons.  For this purpose the researcher selected an available random sample of both ganders to test the aging depression in the Jordanian environment conclusively.The study sample consisted of 180 male and female elder persons who have been selected upon their age segment. The researcher also developed the geriatric depression scale which was prepared by Yesavage,1986 and includes 15 items.The degrees of response to the scale were changed for dual to five-point where each item has five alternatives. The veracity of the scale was verified, upon the confidence of concomitant test, through calculating the correlation coefficient between the scores of examined respondents on the scale and their results according to Beck Test. The coefficient was 0.74.The significance of scale stability were confirmed by re applying the test after 15 days on the same sample. The scale obtained good significant stability where the correlation between both applications was 0.88.The results showed that the coefficients of internal structure confidence for the depression scale ranged between (0.333- 0.723).  all items were significant at (a£ 0.05) which indicate that all items of the scale have high significance of internal consistency confidence, which is credible in discovering the depression of elder persons in Jordan.The stability of the scale was verified through Cronbach’s Alpha for internal consistency and the midi-partition by using Searman and Brown Equation.  The stability coefficient was 0.77 by using cronbach’s alpha’ while it was 0.83 by using 0.83 by using Spearman-Brown equation.The bi-variance analysis indicated no difference among the responses of elder persons on the scale attributed to the age and interaction between age-gender.  The values of F were 0.24 and 0.551 respectively.  The analysis also indicated differences attributed to gender where F value was 10.471, which showed that there were statistically significant differences between male and female elder persons and to the favor of male persons.  The results showed that the percentage of female elder persons who scored <13.5 on the scale was 93.1 %.  By comparing such percentage with male elder persons we found that the percentage of older persons who scored <13.5 was 82.4. The results also indicated that female elder persons who suffered a high degree of depression (≥ 10) on the scale was 77.8 % compared to 88.9% for the male elder perso In the light of these results the researcher submitted soe recommendations and suggestions.