To explore mental health help-seeking behaviours among East Asian American dementia caregivers and construct a theory grounded in their behaviour patterns.
Qualitative using constructivist grounded theory design.
We recruited 20 East Asian American dementia caregivers between August 2023 and March 2024 using purposive sampling. We conducted one-on-one interviews and analysed the data using constructivist grounded theory coding.
We constructed a theory including six concepts and 22 categories. While ‘providing care’, caregivers manage caregiving tasks and personal life, experiencing caregiving challenges. ‘Individual capacity’ is a key to perceiving caregiving situations and ‘considering seeking support’. Various factors can affect ‘using support’. Different types of support can be used separately or in combination. When receiving adequate support, caregivers can ‘gain benefits from support’. These benefits, alongside individual capacities, can shape caregivers' ‘outlook on the present and the future’.
This study explains the mental health help-seeking process within East Asian culture, broadening perspectives on diverse populations and highlighting insights into culturally tailored services.
This study offers clinicians and communities insights into the mental health help-seeking process among East Asian American dementia caregivers and highlights strategies to encourage their use of mental health services.
This theory incorporates aspects of East Asian culture, addressing a research gap in studies of Asian Americans. It may enhance understanding of culturally tailored approaches and facilitate future funding for research and services, considering cultural diversity.
The Standards for Reporting Qualitative Research.
No Patient or Public Contribution.
To clarify the concept of life space in community-dwelling older adults to provide a clear and standardised conceptual basis for further research.
Rogers' evolutionary approach was used to identify surrogate terms, related terms, attributes, antecedents and consequences.
Literature from 1936 to 2025 was searched from PubMed, CINAHL, ProQuest, Cochrane databases, Scopus, Web of Science and CNKI.
A total of 46 articles were included for further analysis and synthesis. The attributes of life space in community-dwelling older adults were dynamic variability, multidimensionality and interaction between intrinsic abilities and external environmental demands. Antecedents were classified into four categories, namely, individual, physical, psychological and social factors. Life space can bring positive consequences, promoting walking, assessing the risk of falling, predicting cognitive decline, facilitating rehabilitation and improving quality of life, as well as negative consequences, causing diminished subjective well-being, heightened loneliness, increased risks of hospital readmission and mortality.
Life space, as a spatial indicator of a person's range of mobility, reflects older adults' physical range of motion, the frequency of activity, their need for assistance and the level of social participation. Older adults with adequate life space in the community are more likely to engage in outdoor activities. In contrast, restricted life space can lead to adverse outcomes.
Surrogate terms, related terms, attributes, antecedents and consequences identified by the concept analysis approach will contribute to a greater understanding of life space. These analytical findings establish an essential conceptual framework for future research while offering evidence-based theoretical guidance to improve life space in community-dwelling older adults, ultimately enhancing health outcomes and quality of life.
No patient or public contribution.