Spouse as next of kind in nursinghome

Project summary

Abstract English

Other studies confirm that the separation process when one spouse is admitted to a nursing home involves difficult decisions as well as emotional stress. My intention is to try to understand and explain this phenomenon by use of Bourdieu’s terminology and methodology (praxeology). A tentative research question may be ”Why do problems between spouses and staff at nursing homes arise?” . The research question is tentative since I do not yet know that this is the essence of the informants’ narratives.  The technical aspect of the research method is based on life history research.  This involves repeated interviews with the informants over an extended period of time and involves dialogues about life and family from the remaining spouse’s perspective. Life history narratives become life history research when the researcher reads and understands the narrative in the historical and cultural context they refer to.

Empirical data may emerge from three sources – individual dialogues with the spouses and observations in the nursing home. The aim is to establish the nursing home as a field and to investigate the positions at play there.   

The research may primarily contribute to explaining and understanding. Subsequently nursing home staff may be given the opportunity to learn from the available data and thereby follow up on the authorities’ policies and possibly benefit from the experiences of spouses who have had a devastating experience of separation.

Purpose: The project aims to use life history research as a means of understanding and describing the experiences of a spouse or significant other with loved ones in nursing homes.

Background: Personal experience inspired a need to explain, comprehend and inspire improved interaction between the spouse and nursing home staff.