Date on Master's Thesis/Doctoral Dissertation

8-2022

Document Type

Doctoral Dissertation

Degree Name

Ph. D.

Department

Psychological and Brain Sciences

Degree Program

Clinical Psychology, PhD

Committee Chair

Barbee, Anita P.

Committee Co-Chair (if applicable)

Salmon, Paul G.

Committee Member

Salmon, Paul G.

Committee Member

Lewine, Richard

Committee Member

Zahorik, Pavel

Committee Member

Valentine, Jeffrey

Author's Keywords

sexuality; quality of life; aging; older adults

Abstract

Sex and intimacy are important components of quality of life (Syme, 2014). Previous research found a positive relation between quality of life and sexual satisfaction (Chao et al., 2011), but how this relation may or may not impact end-of-life plans was unexplored. This study explored if the relation between quality of life and sexual satisfaction determined if community-dwelling middle-aged or older adults in the US have or was willing to incorporate sexual health within their formal or informal end-oflife plan. Correlation analyses examined cross-sectional survey data. Findings revealed a statistically significant correlation between quality of life and sexual satisfaction, no correlation between quality of life and the outcome variables (i.e., SH_FEOLP, SH_IEOLP, WIL_FOR, WIL_INF), no relation between sexual satisfaction and SH_FEOLP or SH_IEOLP, and a negative statistically significant correlation between sexual satisfaction and WIL_FOR and WIL_INF. 2% of participant’s had included sexual health in their formal end-of-life plan (n=14) and 2% had included sexual health in their informal end-of-life plan (n=18). 24% of participants were willing to include sexual health in their formal end-of-life plan (n=179) and 21% were willing to include sexual health in their informal end-of-life plan (n=154). Although findings were not significant future research could explore the willingness to include sexual health within one’s endof- life plan as several participants were “neither willing nor unwilling” to include sexual health in their formal or informal end-of-life plan, 21% and 15% respectively. Further exploration of these participants may generate valuable discussion regarding the importance of sexual health as aging progresses. Keywords: sexuality, quality of life, aging, older adults

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