老年人精神赡养需求的社会建构与多元协同治理路径

The Social Construction of Older Adults’ Needs for Emotional Support and Pathways for Multi-Stakeholder Collaborative Governance

摘要: 我国人口老龄化与家庭结构变迁使老年人精神赡养问题日益突出，本文借助社会建构理论，分析精神赡养需求如何从个体困扰上升为公共议题。老年人精神赡养问题的制度回应面临规则模糊及强制手段与情感自愿之间的内在矛盾，更根本的困境在于老年人精神孤独并非仅是子女“不回家”所致，而是其社会交往网络在代际、社区与角色认同层面发生系统性断裂的结果。为此，应从重建社会支持网络、弘扬积极老龄化理念、完善法律底线保障三个维度协同推进，实现制度工具与社会政策的有机整合，系统回应老年人的精神赡养需求。

Abstract: China’s aging population and changing family structures have made the issue of emotional support for the elderly increasingly prominent. Drawing on social construction theory, this paper analyzes how the need for emotional support has evolved from an individual concern into a public issue. Institutional responses to the issue of emotional support for the elderly face challenges such as ambiguous regulations and an inherent contradiction between coercive measures and emotional voluntariness. The more fundamental dilemma lies in the fact that the emotional isolation experienced by the elderly is not merely caused by their children “not coming home,” but rather results from systemic fractures in their social networks at the levels of intergenerational relationships, community ties, and role identity. Therefore, efforts should be advanced in a coordinated manner across three dimensions—rebuilding social support networks, promoting the concept of active aging, and improving legal safeguards—to achieve the organic integration of institutional tools and social policies, thereby systematically addressing the emotional well-being needs of the elderly.