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. 2024 Jan 3;24(1):9.
doi: 10.1186/s12877-023-04616-4.

How age and health status impact attitudes towards aging and technologies in care: a quantitative analysis

Julia Offermann  1 , Wiktoria Wilkowska  2 , Thea Laurentius  3 , L Cornelius Bollheimer  3 , Martina Ziefle  2
Affiliations

How age and health status impact attitudes towards aging and technologies in care: a quantitative analysis

Julia Offermann et al. BMC Geriatr. .

Abstract

Background: Increasing proportions of geriatric patients pose tremendous challenges for our society. Developments in assistive technologies have the potential to support older and frail people in aging and care. To reach a sustainable adoption of these technologies, the perceptions and wishes of future users must be understood. In particular, the relationships between individual health-related factors, and the perceptions of aging and using assistive technologies in severe health situations must be empirically examined.

Methods: Addressing this research gap, our quantitative study (N = 570) investigates the impact of diverse future users' age and health status on their a) perceptions of aging, b) perceptions and acceptance of using assistive technologies in aging and care, as well as c) end-of-life decisions regarding technology usage. For this, four groups were segmented for the comparison of younger (< 50 years) healthy, younger chronically ill, older (50 + years) healthy, and older chronically ill participants.

Results: The results revealed that health status is more decisive for age-related perceptions compared to age. The technology-related perceptions were slightly impacted by either chronological age or health status. The end-of-life decisions showed the most striking differences in the willingness to use assistive technologies, revealing older chronically ill participants to have more restrained attitudes towards technology usage than older healthy as well as all younger participants.

Conclusions: The findings suggest that the benefits of assistive technologies in private or professional care contexts should be communicated and implemented tailored to the respective user group's needs. Moreover, the results allow us to derive practical implications within the geriatric care context.

Keywords: Aging; Assistive technology; Care; End-of-life decisions; Quantitative analyses; Technology acceptance.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no competing interests.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Overview of the online survey design (for more details see Appendix 1)
Fig. 2
Fig. 2
Evaluation of the perceived health status (mentally and physically) for the segmented groups (asterisks (**) indicate a significance level of p < .01)
Fig. 3
Fig. 3
Descriptive statistics of perceived vitality of the segmented groups (bars represent means and asterisks indicate the significance level: * p < .05; ** p < .01)
Fig. 4
Fig. 4
Descriptive statistics of positive and negative effects of aging for the segmented groups (bars represent means and asterisks indicate the significance level: *p < .05; **p < .01)
Fig. 5
Fig. 5
Descriptive statistics of perceived benefits and barriers of assistive technology for the segmented groups (bars represent means and asterisks indicate the significance level: *p < .05; **p < .01)
Fig. 6
Fig. 6
Descriptive statistics of acceptance of assistive technology for the segmented groups (bars represent means and asterisks indicate the significance level: *p < .05; **p < .01)
Fig. 7
Fig. 7
Opinions on life-end decisions (“…prolong life”) for the segmented groups (illustrated are relative frequencies in %)
Fig. 8
Fig. 8
Opinions on life-end decisions (“…delay death”) for the segmented groups (illustrated are relative frequencies in %)
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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