TY - JOUR
T1 - Differential characteristics of clinical psychologists treating younger and older clients
AU - Shmotkin, Dov
AU - Eyal, Nitza
AU - Lomranz, Jacob
N1 - Funding Information:
Dov Shmotkin, Nitza Eyal and Jacob Lomranz are affiliated with the Department of Psychology, Tel-Aviv University, Israel. This study was supported by a grant of the P. Sapir Center for Development, Tel-Aviv University, Israel. The authors wish to thank Avi Eidelstein, Dafna Pelah, and Meidan Twel for their assistance. Address correspondence to Dov Shmotkin, The unit of the Psychology of Adulthood and Aging, Department of Psychology, Tel-Aviv University, Tel-Aviv 69978, Israel.
PY - 1993/5/14
Y1 - 1993/5/14
N2 - This study sought to differentiate between psychologists working with clients who are in either the fist or second half of life, focusing on various personal and psychological characteristics whose role remained equivocal. Two groups were delineated from an initial sample of 190 Israeli clinical psychologists. The first group (N = 46) worked with children and/or adolescents, and the second (N = 29), with mid-life and/or elderly adults, with both optionally working with young adults. In terms of personal variables, the group treating older clients was found to be older, to contain a greater proportion of women, and to have longer professional experience, but showed no significant difference in marital status; in regard to the psychological variables, this group was found to have higher subjective age and lower death concern, but revealed no significant differences in the evaluations of father and mother. In a stepwise discriminant analysis, only age, gender and death concern entered the equation. The results suggest that psychologists' actual engagement in work with clients in earlier or later phases of life involves certain predispositions, possibly facilitating the approach to the target populations. Further research is still required in order to delineate the implications of the differential characteristics for the matching of clients of different ages and individual psychologists.
AB - This study sought to differentiate between psychologists working with clients who are in either the fist or second half of life, focusing on various personal and psychological characteristics whose role remained equivocal. Two groups were delineated from an initial sample of 190 Israeli clinical psychologists. The first group (N = 46) worked with children and/or adolescents, and the second (N = 29), with mid-life and/or elderly adults, with both optionally working with young adults. In terms of personal variables, the group treating older clients was found to be older, to contain a greater proportion of women, and to have longer professional experience, but showed no significant difference in marital status; in regard to the psychological variables, this group was found to have higher subjective age and lower death concern, but revealed no significant differences in the evaluations of father and mother. In a stepwise discriminant analysis, only age, gender and death concern entered the equation. The results suggest that psychologists' actual engagement in work with clients in earlier or later phases of life involves certain predispositions, possibly facilitating the approach to the target populations. Further research is still required in order to delineate the implications of the differential characteristics for the matching of clients of different ages and individual psychologists.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=0027274034&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1300/J018v12n03_02
DO - 10.1300/J018v12n03_02
M3 - מאמר
AN - SCOPUS:0027274034
VL - 12
SP - 3
EP - 16
JO - Clinical Gerontologist
JF - Clinical Gerontologist
SN - 0731-7115
IS - 3
ER -