Social well-being of elderly people (based on the survey results)

The paper presents the study of the problem of social well-being of elderly people and analyses the outcome of appraisals given by elderly people to their own health and health maintenance activities. Basing on the sociological tradition of studying a social well-being and health phenomenon, the authors have identified the peculiarities of social practices of elderly people living in Tomsk Oblast and correlated social well-being of elderly people with their own health appraisals. The paper gives the survey results (the sample included 400 persons) that allow evaluating the degree of satisfaction with life, health, material status, social activity and identifying life preferences, values and orientations of the elderly in Tomsk Oblast. During the problem studying the hermeneutical approach and the methods of comparative analysis and mathematical statistics were applied.