Aging & Social Change: Eleventh Interdisciplinary Conference

Abstract

The literature clearly points to the positive effects of using the information and communication technologies (ICT) among the elderly, including the improvement of social connections, instilling a sense of empowerment, enhancing access to information and entertainment. Nonetheless, a significant proportion of older people cannot directly benefit from technological advancements. With a sample of Hong Kong older adults who had participated in the co-creation activities on developing an online platform for accessing social services and the “Elder DJ” programme, this qualitative study aims to examine what factors could lead to the hurdles that prevent or drive them in better use of the Internet, thus more favourable outcomes related to their wellbeing could be promoted. By using the constructivist grounded theory, focus group and in-depth interviews were conducted with 34 older people aged 65-80 who were affiliated with the abovementioned activities, and also 19 professionals and consultants involved. Through the interviews with the key informants, we found that motivation is the most critical element to enable older people to acknowledge how their daily living, social life, and health are closely related to ICT, so that they are willing to learn and utilize the technologies more intensively. The learning pace, cognitive abilities, specific health and social needs and preferences of the older people are also found to be the important attributes and areas of “age-friendliness” for designers, manufacturers and service providers to consider when they aim to provide ICT-related training programmes, devices, software or applications to elder persons.