Achieving family generativity and well-being : self-transcendent values of Singapore’s terminally ill patients

• Main Author: Koh, Roxanne See Hui
• Other Authors: Ho Hau Yan Andy
• Format: Final Year Project
• Language: English
• Published: 2018
• Subjects: DRNTU::Social sciences
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/10356/73919
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

As Singapore is facing a demographic shift towards an aging population, it is confronted with the urgent need to provide a holistic palliative care to enhance a sense of well-being among the terminally ill patients. The transmission of self-transcendent values serves to enhance their sense of well-being. In transmitting their self-transcendent values, the terminally ill patients derive a sense of generativity, thus fostering their sense of dignity and diminishing their death anxiety, which in turn lead to an enhance sense of well-being. This study is the first to investigate the nature of self-transcendent values of terminally ill patients. Through in-depth qualitative interviews, the findings revealed the nature of four self-transcendent values from the perspective of four terminally ill patients in Singapore. The four self-transcendent values were categorized as individual-based self-transcendent values (i.e., good health and morality) and family-based selftranscendent values (i.e., filial piety and family solidarity). The findings of this study also revealed the process of achieving family generativity. Specifically, the terminally ill patients’ family generative concern (i.e., continuation of their family lineage) led to their family generative action (i.e., transmission of self-transcendent values), which in turn, facilitate their attainment of family generativity. Therefore, this elucidated the transmission of self-transcendent values as viable way to attain a sense of family generativity. Implications of the findings for advanced care planning, life review interventions, and treatment conversations were discussed with the goal of enhancing psychosocial palliative care practices, and thereby bolstering a sense of well-being for the terminally ill patients in Singapore.