the prediction of psychological well-being based on death anxiety and self-compassion in the elderly

Introduction: elderly is a critical period in human life that poses high risk and problems to aged people. however, a high psychological well-being enables elderly people to deal with these problems and disorientations. therefore, the present study aims to investigate the relationship between selfcompassion and death anxiety with psychological well-being in the elderly. method: the present study is a descriptive correlational research conducted on old men in a part time retirement home in kermanshah. a nonrandom and volunteer sample of 300 elderly people from the mehregan part-time retirement home in kermanshah (iran) participated in the study. to collect data, ryff’s psychological well-being questionnaire (1989), short self-compassion forms of raes et al. (2011), and templer’s death anxiety (1970) were used. collected data were analyzed using the pearson correlation coefficient and the stepwise multiple regression analysis. results: the results showed that there is a positive and significant relationship between selfcompassion and psychological well-being (r = 0.61) while there is a negative significant relationship between psychological well-being and death anxiety (r = -0.20). the results of multiple regression analysis using stepwise method showed that over-identified, self-kindness, isolation, mindfulness, death anxiety, and self-judgment, in the order of their importance, together are capable of predicting 57% of the changes in psychological well-being. conclusion: according to the results of this study, enhancing self-compassion and elaboration and implementation of strategies to reduce the anxiety of death can enhance the psychological well-being of the elderly, especially in the centers which keep the elderly.