Effects of Socialization on Emotional Efficacy of Elderly

Human beings are social animals and socialization is considered to be one of the most important milestones in human development. Elderly people’s socialization pattern gets interrupted and restricted due to a number of factors Including retirement, physical illness, other physical deformities, etc. This might influence their emotional intelligence; the way they handle their emotions. The present study attempts to understand the effect of socialization on personal, intra personal, inter personal and overall emotional efficacy of elderly. The sample for the present study consisted of 74 participants at the age group of 60-75 years, who are diabetic patients for at least past 5 years.  Among which 40 of them are part of intense socialization program for a period of past 1 year composed of the study group and 34 of them with little opportunity to socialize in their daily life. The instrument used for present study is the Emotional Intelligence Inventory (EII) by Dr. Immanuel Thomas and Sushama S. The results showed that there exists highly significant mean difference in emotional intelligence between the study group and the control group. All the mean differences on personal efficacy, interpersonal efficacy, intra personal efficacy and overall efficacy were found highly significant.  Thus the results of the present study imply that the immediate need for socialization of elderly has to be taken care of.