The reality worlds of retirees: an Israeli case-control study

The conceptual point of departure of this study was Cantril's "patterns of human concerns" as reflecting reality worlds. Subjects were 805 "on-time" retirees and 260 kibbutz members (who do not retire) interviewed at three points in time. We asked two questions: Can modal themes in this map of concerns be identified as characteristic of an Israeli cohort of the young elderly? Do gender, class, and retiree/kibbutz status lead to meaningful differences in mapping the world? A quite common modal pattern of concerns was found in the retiree sample, with a central focus on family and interpersonal relations. Commonalities between the different sociocultural groups seemed more striking than the differences.