Help-seeking and silence on family issues among older Chinese immigrants

Seeking help when facing intergenerational conflict is a complex process, particularly for Chinese older immigrants adapting to life in a new country. Although family issues have attracted growing scholarly attention, research on how minority older adults engage with formal support systems remains limited. Bilingual social workers offer valuable insights that can inform service delivery and policy development. This study explores how Chinese social workers in Auckland perceive the help-seeking experiences and challenges faced by older Chinese immigrants when encountering family problems. Using a qualitative approach, the study recruited 17 Chinese social workers through purposive and snowball sampling to participate in semi-structured interviews, followed by a codebook-style thematic analysis. The analysis generated three main themes: cognitive dissonance, psychological barriers, and resource allocation constraints. The findings reveal that older Chinese immigrants encounter both internal and external obstacles when accessing formal support, including mistrust, cultural expectations regarding family harmony, and systemic limitations, resulting in a significant disconnect between older immigrants and available support systems. Based on these findings, the study recommends increasing investment in bilingual social workers and culturally adaptive services, while enhancing public outreach to strengthen older immigrants’ trust in formal support, thereby more effectively addressing their needs.