Smart and Age-friendly Communities: A Review of Research, Policy and Literature

Abstract

Ageing of the population and increasing life expectancy for both sexes present new challenges in caring for older adults. The development of information and communication technology (ICT) brings new forms of living in smart, age-friendly communities. We have adopted a scientific literature review. The selection of articles was made as per the following inclusion criteria: accessibility, scientificity, content relevance, and topicality. The paper aims to present a review of the existing literature that combines smart and age-friendly communities. Here, we find limited literature that examines both smart and age-friendly residential communities. The current development of such communities is focused mainly on urban areas and can be a key solution for the rapidly growing population of older adults. We highlight some key issues, such as digital illiteracy among older adults, the inadequacy of smart technology for older adults and the exclusion of vulnerable marginalised social groups. With the development of smart and age-friendly communities, new models must consider the gaps that we have identified in this paper.