Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-t8hqh Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-23T07:52:44.870Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Facts on Law and Ageing Quiz: older people's knowledge of their legal rights

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 November 2008

ISRAEL DORON  and
PERLA WERNER
ISRAEL DORON*
Affiliation:
Faculty of Social Welfare and Health Sciences, Department of Gerontology, Haifa University, Israel.
PERLA WERNER
Affiliation:
Faculty of Social Welfare and Health Sciences, Department of Gerontology, Haifa University, Israel.
*
Address for correspondence: Israel Doron, Faculty of Social Welfare and Health Sciences, Department of Gerontology and School of Social Work Haifa University, Haifa, Israel, 31905. Email: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Until now, no attempt has been made to develop a research tool to provide a broad descriptive picture of the actual knowledge that older people have of their legal rights. This article will describe a first attempt, conducted in Israel, to create such a tool, known as the Facts on Law and Ageing Quiz (FoLAQ). This quiz was developed to provide a short and standardised tool for assessing older people's knowledge of their legal rights in Israel. It is also intended to serve as a research platform for similar studies in other countries worldwide. The research was designed using a quantitative approach. The research population consisted of adult Jews, aged 50 or more years, living in the community in Israel. Using a computer-assisted telephone interview (CATI), a randomly chosen sample of 227 persons aged 50 and over was asked 20 multiple-choice questions on central legal issues, and 13 closed questions on their socio-demographic background. The findings revealed that, in general, the majority of older persons in Israel know little about their legal rights. Specifically, the most vulnerable groups in this context were the less educated, the poor, the older-old, and women. Finally, the findings also showed that knowledge gaps were particularly obvious with regard to (1) national legal schemes covering social security in old age, and (2) the rights of older people regarding Israel's national health insurance scheme.

Keywords

lawlaw and ageingelder lawseniors' rightsfacts on law and ageingknowledge
Type
Research Article
Information
Ageing & Society , Volume 28 , Issue 8 , November 2008 , pp. 1159 - 1174
Copyright
Copyright © 2008 Cambridge University Press

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

American Association of Retired People (AARP). 2000. Where There Is a Will. Legal Documents Among the 50+ Population: Findings From on AARP Survey. AARP, Washington DC.Google Scholar
American Association of Retired People (AARP). 2006. The Costs of Long-Term Care: Public Perceptions Versus Reality. AARP, Washington, DC.Google Scholar
Achenbaum, W. A. 1995. Crossing Frontiers: Gerontology Emerges as a Science. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.Google Scholar
Ailinger, R. L., Lasus, H. and Braun, M. A. 2003. Revision of the facts on osteoporosis quiz. Nursing Research, 52, 3, 198–201.Google Scholar
Breda, J. and Schoenmaekers, D. 2006. Age: a dubious criterion in legislation. Ageing & Society, 26, 529–47.Google Scholar
Central Bureau of Statistics, Israel. 2007. Israeli Population by Age, Religion and Marital Status. Government Press, Jerusalem.Google Scholar
Cherry, K. E., West, R. L., Reese, C. M. and Yassuda, M. 2000. The knowledge of memory aging questionnaire. Educational Gerontology, 26, 195–219.Google Scholar
Cicero, D. and Bridges, K. 2003. Perceptions and Opinions of Assisted Living: A Survey of AARP Members in Pennsylvania. American Association of Retired People, Washington DC.Google Scholar
Dayton, K. A., Gallanis, T. P. and Wood, M. M. 2003. Elder law: Readings, Cases, and Materials. Anderson, Cincinnati, Ohio.Google Scholar
De Cruz, P. 1999. Comparative Law in a Changing World. Cavendish, London.Google Scholar
Dieckmann, L., Zarit, S. H., Zarit, J. M. and Gatz, M. 1988. The Alzheimer's disease knowledge test. The Gerontologist, 28, 3, 402–7.Google Scholar
Dean, M. 1997. Japanese Legal System: Text and Materials. Routledge Cavendish, London.Google Scholar
Doron, I. 2003. A multi-dimensional model of elder law: an Israeli example. Ageing International, 28, 3, 242–59.Google Scholar
Doron, I. 2006. Elder law: current issues and future frontiers. European Journal of Ageing, 3, 1, 60–6.Google Scholar
Doron, I. and Gal, I. 2006. The emergence of preventive elder law: an Israeli example. Journal of Cross-Cultural Gerontology, 21, 41–53.Google Scholar
Doron, I. and Hoffman, A. 2005. Time for law: legal literacy and gerontological education. Journal of Gerontological Education, 31, 8, 627–42.Google Scholar
Felstiner, W. L. F., Abel, R. L., and Sarat, A. 1980. The emergence and transformation of disputes: naming, blaming, claiming. Law and Society Review, 15, 631–54.Google Scholar
Frolik, L. A. and Barnes, A. M. 2003. Elder Law: Cases and Materials. LexisNexis, New York.Google Scholar
Frolik, L. A. 2002. The developing field of elder law redux: ten years after. Elder Law Journal, 10, 1–14.Google Scholar
Frolik, L. A. and Kaplan, R. L. 2006. Elder Law in a Nutshell. West Thomson, St Paul, Minnesota.Google Scholar
Fusilier, M. R. and Williams, J. G. 1996. Awareness of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) among personnel managers. Journal of Individual Employment Rights, 7, 4, 325–29.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Heckman, T. G., Heckman, B. D., Kochman, A., Sikkema, K. J., Suhr, J. and Goodkin, K. 2002. Psychological symptoms among persons 50 years of age and older living with HIV disease. Ageing and Mental Health, 6, 2, 121–28.Google Scholar
Jackson, E. and Warner, J. 2002. How much do doctors know about consent and capacity? Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine, 95, 601–3.Google Scholar
Kannus, P., Parkkari, J., Koskinen, S., Niemi, S., Palvanen, M., Järvinen, M. and Vuori, I. 1999. Fall-induced injuries and deaths among older adults. Journal of American Medical Association, 281, 20, 1895–99.Google Scholar
Larson, J. H. 1988. The marriage quiz: college students' beliefs in selected myths about marriage. Family Relations, 37, 3–11.Google Scholar
Marin, G., Vanoss, B. and Perez-Stable, E. J. 1990. Feasibility of a telephone survey to study a minority community: Hispanics in San Francisco. American Journal of Public Health, 80, 3, 323–26.Google Scholar
McDonald, A. and Taylor, M. 2006. Older People and the Law. Policy Press. Bristol, UK.Google Scholar
Meager, N., Tyers, C., Perryman, S., Rick, J, and Willison, R. 2002. Awareness, Knowledge and Exercise of Individual Employment Rights. Department of Trade and Industry, London.Google Scholar
Neugarten, D. A. (ed.) 1996. The Meanings of Age: Selected Papers of Bernice L. Neugarten. University of Chicago Press, Chicago.Google Scholar
Palmore, E. 1977. Facts on aging: a short quiz. The Gerontologist, 17, 4, 315–20.Google Scholar
Palmore, E. B. 1980. The facts of aging quiz: a review of findings. The Gerontologist, 20, 6, 669–72.Google Scholar
Palmore, E. B. 1981. The facts on aging quiz: part two. The Gerontologist, 21, 4, 431–37.Google Scholar
Roach Anleu, S. L. 2000. Law and Social Change. Sage, London.Google Scholar
Rothman, M. B. and Dunlop, B. D. 2006. Elders and the courts: judicial policy for an aging America. Journal of Aging and Social Policy, 18, 2, 31–46.Google Scholar
Shachar, Y. 1995. History and sources of Israeli law. In Shapira, A. and DeWitt-Arar, K. C. (eds) Introduction to the Law of Israel. Kluwer Law International, Boston, Massachusetts, 1–32.Google Scholar
Silberman, S. L. 2004. 2003 Minnesota Advance Directives Survey. American Association of Retired People, Washington DC.Google Scholar
Soden, A. 2005. Advising the Older Client. LexisNexis Canada, Ottawa.Google Scholar
Triplett, T. and Abi-Habib, N. 2003. Socio-demographic Study of Telephone Survey Nonrespondents. The Urban Institute, Washington DC.Google Scholar
Turner, J. and Korezyk, S. 2004. Pension Participant Knowledge About Plan Fees. AARP – The Public Policy Institute, Washington DC.Google Scholar
Wilson, J., Setterlund, D. and Tilse, C. 2003. ‘I know I signed something’: older people, families and social workers' understanding of the legal aspects of entry to residential care. Australian Social Work, 55, 2, 155–65.Google Scholar
Wollschlager, Christian. 1997. Historical trends of civil litigation in Japan, Arizona, Sweden, and Germany: Japanese legal culture in light of judicial statistics. In Baum, H. (ed.) Japan: Economic Success and Legal System. Walter de Gruyter, Berlin, 89–134.Google Scholar