A quotidian point of view from a positive psychology perspective in a group of elderly people:

Abstract

In an attempt to collectively build a healthy way of “being” in this life in the year 2007 a permanent group of fifteen elderly people started to meet in the Sociedad Israelita (Israeli Society) from San Luis, coordinated by a social psychologist, and they continue meeting systematically once a week. This psycho educational Project of Intervention aimed to generate a space for meeting, reflecting and discussing ideas, in which participants could share their existential experiences, strengthen their communication bonds and revise those behaviors that hinder an active adaptation to reality, with the purpose of consolidating those positive qualities and prosocial behaviors that could eventually have an impact on their subjective well-being. In the implementation of this project, and with the contribution of Positive Psychology and Critic Gerontology, different contents were dealt with. These contents could be summarized into the following main points: subjectivation processes of elderly people and construction of their identities, the step forward towards the third age as a vital process, negative attitudes as the hegemonic model prevailing in our cultures, prevention and promotion of psychical health and development of positive qualities. This paper is an attempt to give an account of the process generated along the experience aforementioned and of the changes that took place in the subjective positioning of the members of the group. Sharing the knowledge and experience acquired will allow the reflection in relation to the need of designing spaces and strategies of salugenic intervention aimed at a specific age group of the population: elderly people.