Israeli perspectives on elder abuse

Despite the prevailing agreement among researchers that the increasing rate of elder abuse in Israel is relatively understudied, not sufficiently identified, and not appropriately addressed, literature on elderly abuse in the Israeli society remains limited. The common discourse on aging, eldercare, and elder abuse and neglect, mainly revolves around the immigration status of the elderly as well as the circumstantial predicaments that typically accompany immigrants living in a multicultural, transitory society. This pilot study examined attitudes towards elderly maltreatment as commonly perceived by the two dominant ethnicities currently constituting Israeli society - the Ashkenazi and the Sephardic. Psychological neglect, neglect/abandonment, and physical aggression were considered to be most prominent exemplars of elder abuse within the Israeli sample and across gender and ethnicities. Although there were no significant group differences in the exemplars given of extreme elder abuse, the Ashkenazi sample gave greater emphasis to physical and economic abuse as forms of moderate abuse, and to neglect/abandonment and disrespect as forms of mild abuse. There was only one significant gender difference: in providing examples of moderate elder abuse, Israeli women put more emphasis on disrespect than Israeli men. Overall, it appears that despite considerable diversity in the Israeli population, as related to ethnic and immigration status, there may be considerable consensus on the kinds of behavior that constitute maltreatment of elderly parents.