Participatory research on digital (in)equalities in care relationships among older people living alone

Abstract

Purpose: The digital age adds new cultural expectations of care, collaboration and mutuality, and has the potential to perpetuate inequalities between generations, income groups and countries due to available care resources and infrastructure. Living alone raises specific challenges to care work and on and offline caring relationships. Digitalisation has contributed to the connectedness of young and old age groups at the same time as increasing support needs for older people coming to terms with digital developments both in terms of equipment and life administration. The European project EQualCare aims to further understanding of, and policy development on, the intersections of digitalisation with intergenerational care work and care relationships of older people living alone, and to contribute to reducing inequalities through collaboration and participatory research.

Method: This paper aims to give insight into the process of participatory action research (PAR) with older people in the community across four countries and reflects on experiences made by academic and co-researchers. Following the emancipatory underpinnings of PAR, which aims to reduce inequalities through collaboration and co-design, EQualCare involved nine teams of co-researchers across Finland, Germany, Latvia and Sweden making older people the centre of policy development. Co-researchers were involved in formulating research aims, collecting data, reflecting on data, formulating and disseminating recommendations for local policy stakeholders.

Results and Discussion: Co-researchers’ motivation to invest considerable time and effort was driven by a desire to create a more equal future for older people living alone. Moreover, they were keen to involve marginalised older people and became frustrated when this proved difficult. Power dynamics played a role throughout the process but became productive as roles and responsibilities were renegotiated. Doing PAR with older people can be emotionally challenging for co-researchers when negative feelings around ageing are encountered.