Spirituality and religiosity related to socio-demographic data of the elderly population*

Abstract

Objective:  to describe the relationship of spirituality and religiosity with gender, age and family income of the elderly people.  Methods:  this is a cross-sectional study with 643 elderly people using a socio-demographic questionnaire and a brief multidimensional measure of religiosity/spirituality. A descriptive analysis, Student’st-test (sex) and Pearson correlation for age and Spearman for income (p<0.05) were performed.  Results:  female prevailed, age group 60|-70 years old, living with the partner, education level of 1|-5 years of study and income of a minimum wage. The female presented higher averages than the male in most of the dimensions of religiosity and spirituality. The age presented a weak positive correlation in the dimensions of organizational religiosity and global self-assessment; while income did not present a statistically significant correlation.  Conclusion:  female and older adults presented greater dimensions of religiosity and spirituality, while income did not present significant correlation.