Development, Delivery, and Utilization of Services Under the Older Americans Act: A Perspective of Asian-American Elderly

250 p.Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 1987.Based on the principle of citizen participation, the theory of cultural pluralism, and the concept of service partnership, this study focused on the Asian American elderly in a large midwestern city to examine the problems related to the development, delivery, and utilization of the services sponsored by the Title III of the Older Americans Act.Data for this study were collected from four sources: (1) the 1980 census relative to the economic and social conditions of Asian American elderly, (2) mailed questionnaires to 62 agency directors, (3) interviews with 11 Asian American professional staff and four board members, and (4) interviews with 18 Asian American elderly clients.The 1980 census data illustrate that the Asian American elderly, as a group, are in better socioeconomic condition than other minority groups. However, the census data also reveal that a significant number of Asian American elderly either do not have any income or only have marginal income. The findings of the primary data shows that there are six major variables attracting Asian American elderly clients to OAA services. Among them are: (1) the location of the agency in or near an Asian community, (2) Asian staff and board representation, (3) outreach activities conducted in Asian languages, (4) bicultural staff who have knowledge on Asian American elderly's special needs and values, 5) bilingual staff, and (6) the ability of agency programs to meet the unique needs of the target population.This study suggests that, based on the principle of citizen participation, the Older Americans Act service delivery system should include Asian Americans as agency board members, professional staff members, and indigenous service providers. This study also recommends the Administration on Aging, state units on aging, and area agencies on aging to expand the scope and scale of funding the indigenous Asian social agencies, and to encourage social agencies to have more Asian American board and staff members.U of I OnlyRestricted to the U of I community idenfinitely during batch ingest of legacy ETD