The "Older people being online" - research conducted by Open University mirrors very much my research findings during my requirements collections phase (before I decided to build the Teletalker as a tool to demonstrate the benefits of online connectivity to older people www.teletalker.org).
Their initial findings are: "
- that older people need an incentive to get and stay online;
- that relatives and trainers need to structure their help and use repetitive strategies to aid retention;
- that social networking is a step further than most older people take while email, Skype, and closed mailing lists or forums related to their interests are the most common applications for social interactions."
Read the full paper here.
I find particularly interesting their reflections on the research process, which shows that the research had become an act of collaboration between older people and researchers rather than a directional investigation. In my view it's not easily possible to research older people empirically without getting involved in some way.
Now, I'm wondering whether this would be true for researching any age group (which most likely is because it involves human beings).
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