Medica Jadertina, Vol. 36 No. 3-4, 2006.
Original scientific paper
Process of retirement: an attempt at checking Atchley's model of adjustment
Zvjezdan Penezić
Katica Lacković-Grgin
Andrijana Bačinić
Abstract
Retirement is a normative life event which requires a person’s adjustment. According to this, retirement should be treated as a process which lasts a certain period of time. The process duration and complexity depend on subjective and objective circumstances in which retirement could be in time or earlier, voluntary or
compulsory. According to some American research, Atchley thinks that the retirement process should be treated as a series of adjustments represented through seven phases: the phase when retirement is far away, preretirement phase, honeymoon phase, disappointment phase, reorientation phase, stability phase and terminal phase. These phases are not a sequence of events that everyone goes through, nor are they connected with some
chronological age or time of phase, as is the case with lifespan developmental phases. Although Atchley’s phases are accepted in literature there is a small number of empirical data for data validity. Almost all data are collected on the sample of American subjects.
The aim of this research was to construct the measurement questionnaire for Atchley’s adjustment to retirement phases, and to check how appropriate his model was for the sample of Croatian subjects.
The subjects were 196 retired people in Croatia and Bosnia. The questionnaire consisted partly of the sociodemographic variable measurement, and the list of items related to the retirement process.
The results of our research indicated that there were five phases from Atchley’s model (preparation phase, honeymoon phase, disappointment phase, stability phase and terminal phase). But the descriptors of those phases were somewhat different from Atchley’s descriptors. An additional phase, not mentioned in literature, was identified. We called it the working reactivation phase (with the aim of finding funds for life, but without being employed again).
Keywords
retirement; Atchley's model of retirement; retirement phases
Hrčak ID:
12613
URI
Publication date:
15.6.2007.
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