Relationships among perceived enactment of autonomy, self-care, and holistic health in community-dwelling older adults.

The purpose of this article is to report findings from two studies of community-dwelling older adults. The focus of both studies was on delineating relationships among perceived enactment of autonomy (PEA) and selected self-care and health variables from the perspective of Modeling and Role-Modeling nursing theory. Results indicated that PEA, representing the potential for self-care action, was positively correlated to perceived control and morale in Study 1 and to life satisfaction in Study 2. Significant differences in PEA scores were found based on the health indicators of participation in social activities and reliance on others for shopping in Study 2. In addition, Study 1 found that morale, gender, age, perceived control, and education accounted for 39% of the variance in PEA. Implications are discussed for designing theory-based holistic nursing interventions to support PEA in older adults and to direct future research.