Efectos de los programas univesitarios en personas mayores en su red y apoyo social. El ejemplo de la Universitat Oberta per a Majors.

Abstract

[eng]Introduction. Social support is set as a key dimension to quality of life; in addition, it is an indispensable part of active ageing. That is why we wanted to investigate the effects of social support on students at the Universitat Oberta per a Majors (UOM) of the University of Balearic Islands. In particular, our aim is to describe and analyze the social network and social support for people who have participated in the Senior Diploma and Higher Senior Diploma at the UOM; understanding that these students have increased their social network and that they can use the social support (emotional, informational and material) that they need in different circumstances and processes (reception, perception, request and donation), by linking it to their social capital. Method. To this end, the hypothesis will be tested through a specially created questionnaire based on three principal areas: socio-demographic, social network variables and social support variables. The questionnaire was made using various reference sources and was partially validated by peers and expert judges. The analysis of all the data is processed using the SPSS.21 program. Results. Senior students at the UOM have a good level of social support (emotional, informative and material); they also have a very good perception of this social support and a good social network, both at quantitative and qualitative levels. It can be observed a relationship between the improvement in educational and relational social capital with the social support received, in its various forms. Discussion. This article concludes with some elements for discussion related to the hypotheses: a) there are significant differences among social networks and social supports according to gender, age group, cohabitation status and level of education; b) participating in the UOM produces significant positive changes in seniors' social networks and social supports, especially through the recognition or the improvement in educational and relational social capital; c) most changes that take place occur during the program's first year, whereas these changes stabilize in later years. Finally some proposals for the future are made.