Stories of an Intergenerational Neighborhood: Living & Learning With Older Adults as Health Science Students at a Personal Care Home

An intergenerational community places emphasis on social interaction, exchange, and cooperation across generations (Brown & Henkin, 2014). Intergenerational interaction between older adults (OAs) and youth increases self-esteem, decreases feelings of social isolation, and promotes quality of life (Hofer et al., 2022; Zhong et al., 2020). This project presents a novel intergenerational community created in a personal care home that situates health science students as neighbors to older adult residents. The purpose of this study is to assess the self-perceived impact on quality of life of this novel intergenerational living from the student and OA resident perspective. A descriptive qualitative study design was utilized to illustrate the lived experiences of graduate health science students and OAs living together and the requirement of at least 4 hours of intergenerational interaction a week. Students and OAs from a single personal care home were recruited. Students were assessed pre/post at least 5 months of interaction, while OAs were assessed post. 30 minute semi-structured interviews were completed with student residents pre/post and OAs post. Individual content analysis was followed by consensus coding to validate thematic results. Intergenerational living was valued by students and OAs. The students and OAs identified the experiences as influencing knowledge for future healthcare, breaking ageist stigmas, learning from wisdom, and impacting resident mental health through authentic relationships. Creating intergenerational communities is a concept in its infancy. This arrangement may improve quality of life of both students and OAs, while also increasing the number of new occupational therapy practitioners (OTPs) who are invested in older adult care. Considering the mental impacts of higher education and isolation in older adult communities, OTPs should advocate and consult on the creation of intergenerational living communities.

References

Brown, C. & Henkin, N. (2014). Building communities for all ages: Lessons learned from an intergenerational community-building initiative. Journal of Community and Applied Social Psychology, 24 (1), 63–68. https://doi.org/10.1002/casp.2172

Hofer, J., Kranz, D., & Thomas, N. M. (2022). Willingness of nursing home residents and students to participate in an intergenerational program: Effects of traits and pressing developmental tasks. Journal of Intergenerational Relationships, 21(2), 269–282. https://doi.org/10.1080/15350770.2022.2041527

Zhong, S. Lee, C., Foster, M. J., & Bian, J. (2020). Intergenerational communities: A systematic literature review of intergenerational interactions and older adults’ health-related outcomes. Social Science & Medicine, 264(113374), 1–11. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.socscimed.2020.113374