Global Age-Friendly Cities Research Articles

A Review of Public Sector Engagement in Age-Friendly Community Initiatives

ABSTRACT The global age-friendly cities and communities (AFCC) movement has centered on the involvement of the public sector, calling on high-ranking authorities to commit to improving the built, social, and service environments of their localities. This interpretive review aimed to advance understanding of the ways in which the public sector is involved in AFCC efforts. Based on emergent themes from peer-reviewed articles from the United States and Canada published since 2010, we derived a two-dimensional framework for conceptualizing variability in public sector involvement, encompassing the internal/external (a) locus of responsibility for cross-sector change and (b) target for cross-sector change. We discuss implications for research, policy, practice, and further knowledge development in AFCC implementation.

PROMOTING INTERGENERATIONAL EXCHANGES WITHIN RURAL AGE-FRIENDLY COMMUNITIES: A CBPR APPROACH

Abstract The World Health Organization (WHO) Global Age-Friendly Cities (AFC) guide identifies eight interconnected domains for promoting the well-being, engagement, and participation of older adults in community activities and events. It defines an inclusive society as one that actively encourages older adults to participate in their community’s social, civic, and economic life. Research often prioritizes addressing the physical challenges many older adults face, frequently overlooking societal engagement aspects that promote active aging and inclusion. This research outlines how a Community-Based Participatory Research (CBPR) approach was used to uncover and address the societal stigmas and counterproductive attitudes experienced by older adults in a rural age-friendly designated community. Our CBPR approach is characterized as a process encountered in three stages: (i) conducting a multigenerational survey on age-friendliness, (ii) engaging community members in planning intergenerational opportunities, and (iii) implementing intergenerational engagement activities identified in earlier stages. By participating in methodologies from both CBPR and grounded theory approaches, older adults acquired agency and voice in the research process, thus directly impacting age-friendly outcomes in their communities. Our findings detail the importance of utilizing a CBPR approach when researching core AFC fundamentals that are instrumental in creating inclusive policies and promoting healthful, mutually beneficial intergenerational opportunities.

Needs for Aging in Place: Views of Older Moroccan Adults in the Netherlands.

Due to health and/or financial limitations, older migrants may become especially dependent on their neighborhoods, highlighting the importance of investigating their experiences. We explored older Moroccan adults' views on the relative importance of neighborhood resources for aging in place. Thirty Moroccans aged ≥65 years residing in Amsterdam, Rotterdam, The Hague, and Utrecht were interviewed and asked to perform a ranking task developed with the combined quantitative and qualitative Q methodology. They ranked the relative importance of 38 statements representing the World Health Organization's 8 global age-friendly cities domains, with explanation of their reasoning. By-person factor analysis was performed to identify factors representing distinct viewpoints, which were interpreted with reference to the interviewees' comments. Four viewpoints were identified: "home sweet home"; "connected, well-informed, and engaged"; "suitable and affordable living"; and "a lively neighborhood." The perceived importance of neighborhood resources for aging in place differed among viewpoints. Older Moroccan adults prioritize different neighborhood resources for aging in place. Our findings suggest that their diverse needs can be satisfied by enabling family to live in close proximity, providing diverse, inclusive neighborhoods with affordable, suitable housing, understandable information, social/cultural activities, and care services for vulnerable groups. Future studies may build on our findings to explore older (migrant) adults' views on needs for aging in place in the Netherlands and other western countries.

Age-Friendly Cities: A Systematic Review

Population aging is one of the most significant demographic transformations of the 21st century, since aging brings about changes in the functional capacity of the human being. Over the years, the level of independence and autonomy for carrying out daily activities diminishes, and, thereby, the relationship of the elderly with the environment changes as the person ages, directly affecting the mobility and life quality of this population. In 2007, the World Health Organization (WHO) published the document "Global age-friendly cities: A guide", which presents some strategies for promoting active aging and for the place of residence of the elderly. It proposes that the city´s structure and the public policies directed towards this public shall be integrated with the community´s life. In order to understand how the concept of an age-friendly city has been applied to evaluate cities in different countries, a systematic review was carried out in the Scopus database, based on articles published between 2015 and 2021. The analysis of 38 articles has made it possible to identify that the study field of the quality of the urban environment for the elderly population is new, calling for deeper studies, which includes the development of more adequate methods for evaluating this profile in the cities. The articles analyzed deal with the concept in different ways, but one of the main similarities is related to the use of the method of data collection through interviews and, in spite of using the tool indicated in the document, none applied the methodology proposed by the WHO.

TOWARD STRUCTURAL CHANGE: ADVANCING PRAXIS ON AGE-FRIENDLY CITIES AND COMMUNITIES

Abstract The global age-friendly cities and communities (AFCC) movement has inspired leaders across the public, private, and academic sectors to re-imagine how environments can better support long and healthy lives. There is growing recognition, however, of structural and other constraints that impede the translation of AFCC aspirations into systematic, comprehensive, impactful, and sustainable action. This paper will describe the importance of researchers’ engagement in AFCC praxis to better support the movement toward structural change for aging equity and healthy aging. The paper will present a case example of academic researchers’ long-standing involvement in collaborative efforts toward the development and sustainability of age-friendly community initiatives in New Jersey. The case will emphasize the importance of creating synergies across research, teaching, and service activities; cultivating coordinated AFCC efforts across the mico, meso, and macro levels; and developing sustainable structures for deliberate inter-organizational and multi-sectoral partnerships toward short- and long-term goals.

Towards human-centric planning: Older people's everyday life in neighbourhood spaces in Singapore's public housing

Creating age-friendly environments to enable ageing-in-place has attracted tremendous attention since World Health Organisation launched the Global Age-friendly Cities Project. Learned from British new towns and the Neighbourhood Unit, Singapore's public housing is planned based on abstract planning models. It is acknowledged as a success story of high-rise living and influences housing development in China and other countries. Using Yuhua East neighbourhood as a study case, this article takes a bottom-up approach to examine whether Singapore's public housing, particularly its neighbourhood spaces (i.e., neighbourhood centre, precinct centre, park and green space, void deck, community and eldercare institution, and route), match older people’ spatial experiences and everyday needs. This article argues that abstract planning models and functionalist design approaches result in car-centric planning and space fragmentation. It highlights the necessity to practice human-centric design and plan neighbourhood spaces as parts of a highly cohesive urban space system rather than fragmented pieces.

Critical Age-Friendly Research and Representational Ethics

As the efforts of the Global Age-friendly Cities and Communities movement mature and continue to grapple with society’s shifting dynamics, blind spots and knowledge gaps are exposed. This research applies critical discourse analysis to examine the evolution of Age-friendly NYC using an intersectional lens committed to an ethics of representation. Over 1,000 pages of public records were analyzed to trace the history of this movement in relation to age, race, sexuality, gender, ability, and class. Findings suggest that Age-friendly NYC is a global leader of the age-friendly movement, yet social identities are represented neither equally nor universally in its initiatives. Discussions of race, sexuality, and gender are subtle. They also overlook how these identities may intersect and shape the aging experience for differently positioned older adults. A comprehensive understanding of the aging experiences of those with multiple intersecting identities is needed to inform future age-friendly policies and programs.

‘You really do become invisible’: examining older adults’ right to the city in the United Kingdom

AbstractA global ageing population presents opportunities and challenges to designing urban environments that support ageing in place. The World Health Organization's Global Age-Friendly Cities movement has identified the need to develop communities that optimise health, participation and security in order to enhance quality of life as people age. Ensuring that age-friendly urban environments create the conditions for active ageing requires cities and communities to support older adults’ rights to access and move around the city (‘appropriation’) and for them to be actively involved in the transformation (‘making and remaking’) of the city. These opportunities raise important questions: What are older adults’ everyday experiences in exercising their rights to the city? What are the challenges and opportunities in supporting a rights to the city approach? How can the delivery of age-friendly cities support rights to the city for older adults? This paper aims to respond to these questions by examining the lived experiences of older adults across three cities and nine neighbourhoods in the United Kingdom. Drawing on 104 semi-structured interviews with older adults between the ages of 51 and 94, the discussion centres on the themes of: right to use urban space; respect and visibility; and the right to participate in planning and decision-making. These themes are illustrated as areas in which older adults’ rights to access and shape urban environments need to be addressed, along with recommendations for age-friendly cities that support a rights-based approach.

Age-Friendly Built Environment

Age-friendly built environments have been promoted by the World Health Organisation (WHO, Geneva, Switzerland) under the Global Age-friendly Cities (AFC) movement in which three domains are related to the built environment. These are: housing, transportation, outdoor spaces and public buildings. The aim is to foster active ageing by optimising opportunities for older adults to maximise their independent living ability and participate in their communities to enhance their quality of life and wellbeing. An age-friendly built environment is inclusive, accessible, respects individual needs and addresses the wide range of capacities across the course of life. Age-friendly housing promotes ageing in familiar surroundings and maintains social connections at the neighbourhood and community levels. Both age-friendly housing and buildings provide barrier-free provisions to minimise the needs for subsequent adaptations. Age-friendly public and outdoor spaces encourage older adults to spend time outside and engage with others against isolation and loneliness. Age-friendly public transport enables older adults to get around and enhances their mobility. For achieving an age-friendly living environment, a holistic approach is required to enable independent living, inclusion and active participation of older adults in society. The eight domains of the AFC movement are not mutually exclusive but overlap and support with one another.

WHO's Global Age-Friendly Cities Guide: Its Implications of a Discussion on Social Exclusion among Older Adults.

This study analyzed the World Health Organization’s (WHO) Global Age-Friendly Cities Guide to observe its role in embodying social inclusion of older adults in attempts to prevent social exclusion. Social exclusion refers to the marginalization of individuals and groups from important economic and social opportunities in the society. Many aging societies are implementing social inclusion of older adults as one of their key policy agendas to create a more sustainable and healthy society, in recognition that age functions as one of the essential factors accelerating social exclusion and declining physical and mental health of those affected. In order to explore the pertinence of the WHO guidelines to social inclusion of older adults, content analysis was conducted on each checklist item in the WHO guideline to identify its relation to the four dimensions of social exclusion, which are social interaction, production, consumption, and political engagement. The results showed comprehensive coverage of each dimension by the guideline, although the relative importance of each dimension was unequal. Additional insights were suggested to promote further social inclusion of older adults in the context of an age-friendly environment.

“With Friends Like These”: Unpacking Panicked Metaphors for Population Ageing

Age studies scholars have long noted problems with using a tsunami metaphor to describe population ageing. Age-friendly offers a new way to respond to an increase in older adults. Though critical gerontologists identify the related movement’s limits, “age-friendly” itself is rarely recognized as a metaphor. This paper proposes that, while the metaphor of age-friendly is more benign than that of the tsunami, it still portrays an ageing population as a homogenous problem to be solved through morally obligatory individual actions, thereby participating in a form of age panic. The analysis draws on a humanities-based close reading of the World Health Organization’s 2007 “Global Age-Friendly Cities: A Guide.” The method uncovers attitudes that anchor the metaphor and hamper the movement’s effectiveness, particularly when trying to reach people who have not already been well served all their lives. The emphasis on a narrow version of active ageing feeds a neoliberal imagination that affects how value is assigned to an ageing population. That underlying emphasis needs to shift before new metaphors, policies and practices for population ageing—that allow for the variability and uniqueness of late-life experience—can take hold. How might we reconceptualize the ageing population if we focus on contributions and meaning instead?

Research on age-friendly garden design in China based on the case study of WANSHOU Park

The rate of population aging has reached a high level in China that age-friendly design should be concerned when designing gardens in urban place. Although the generation-skipping guardianship phenomenon always exists in present situation of elderly people in China that grandchildren are taken with the elderly and are involved in their daily activities in most family, the needs of children are neglected in urban garden design. The paper generalized guidelines of age-friendly garden design according to LEED, Chinese garden design standard, and the guideline of global age-friendly cities in Europe. Childrenfriendliness have also been included based on the above-mentioned new guidelines. 29 reports have been collected in the case study of WANSHOU Park which can be characterized as an age-friendly garden involving basic information and scoring records on its environment and facilities. Through the increasement of children-friendly features and installments in the park, the design will have great potential to deal with aging problems.

Distinctions on the Importance of Age-Friendly Services by Old Age Groups: A Comparative Study Between the USA and the EU

Based on the initiative of the World Health Organization in 2007, when describing the global age-friendly cities by a guide to enhance active aging and the age-friendliness of communities, Black and Hyer (2019) presented generational distinctions on the importance of age-friendly community features by focusing efforts on the built, social, and service environment in USA. Their study aimed to examine the differential salience of community features by older generational age groups including Baby Boomers and younger persons 50 years and older, and older cohorts, born before and during WWII. They found that the Chi-square results indicate significant differences across the generational age groups in all domains. We wanted to compare the preference of the same age cohorts in Europe. The sizes of samples were half of the size of samples considered by Black and Hyer, therefore we used z+4 tests which also have shown the distinctions pertaining to preferences on housing and participation in social activities. The differences between ranking in importance of Age-Friendly Community Features by Older Age cohorts in USA and EU are presented and discussed.

How is Respect and Social Inclusion Conceptualised by Older Adults in an Aspiring Age-Friendly City? A Photovoice Study in the North-West of England.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) Global Age-Friendly Cities (AFC) Guide classifies key characteristics of an AFC according to eight domains. Whilst much age-friendly practice and research have focused on domains of the physical environment, those related to the social environment have received less attention. Using a Photovoice methodology within a Community-Based Participatory Research approach, our study draws on photographs, interviews and focus groups among 26 older Liverpool residents (60+ years) to explore how the city promotes respect and social inclusion (a core WHO AFC domain). Being involved in this photovoice study allowed older adults across four contrasting neighbourhoods to communicate their perspectives directly to Liverpool’s policymakers, service providers and third sector organisations. This paper provides novel insights into how: (i) respect and social inclusion are shaped by aspects of both physical and social environment, and (ii) the accessibility, affordability and sociability of physical spaces and wider social processes (e.g., neighbourhood fragmentation) contributed to or hindered participants’ health, wellbeing, intergenerational relationships and feelings of inclusion and connection. Our findings suggest that respect and social inclusion are relevant across all eight domains of the WHO AFC Guide. It is core to an AFC and should be reflected in both city-based policies and evaluations.

Age-Friendly Communities: Creating a conducive environment for the elderly in India

India is one of the nations in the world where the population is undergoing anomalous demographic changes. The increase in longevity and decrease fertility lead to the boom of older people aged 60 and above both in relative and absolute terms. Due to the rise in number, it creates pressure not only on the family but the responsibility shifts to the government also. This issue becomes a significant social problem not only in India but across the globe. The government had taken action by creating policies and programs to provide services to them. Still, the majority of the elderly population is lacking behind in these areas like health facilities, infrastructure, living arrangements suffering from isolation, loneliness, abuse, crime. Nowadays, smart city initiatives are taken by the government across the country but still in process. To involve and facilitate more cities for “age-friendly”, the World Health Organization develop the Global Age-Friendly Cities Guide and a manual “Checklist of Essential Features of Age-Friendly Cities”. Cooperating with 35 urban communities from developed and developing nations, the WHO oversees eight highlights for age-accommodating urban areas in the space of urban life. This paper had an objective to study and understand exiting literature on age-friendly communities in developed and developing countries and draw attention to the need to create age-friendly cities in India. The realization of the needs and demands of older people, the Indian government should give attention to promote and implement more age-friendly communities all over the country. This initiative till now taken in 3 states, i.e., Delhi, Udaipur, and Kolkata-which involved in age-friendly community initiatives collaborated with WHO. In this era of a rapid aging sphere, the communities have to enhance in such a manner where the older population can meet their needs quickly without any conflicts and problem. To conclude, the government and policymaker should emphasize the policies into practices to build age-friendly communities across the country and make better living conditions for “allages”. For timely action and productive recommendation, it is an urgent need on the part of the government, policymakers, researchers, social workers to develop and enhance the community’s facilities, which can gain confidence and wellbeing of the elderly in India.

The Role of Mobility Digital Ecosystems for Age-Friendly Urban Public Transport: A Narrative Literature Review.

Within the context of the intersection of the global megatrends of urbanisation, ageing societies and digitalisation, this paper explores older people’s mobility, with a particular interest in public transport, and a strong consideration of digital/ICT elements. With a focus on (smart) mobility, the paper aims to conceptualise transport, one of the main domains of age-friendly cities as a core element of a smart, age-friendly ecosystem. It also aims to propose a justice-informed perspective for the study of age-friendly smart mobility; to contribute towards a framework for the evaluation of age-friendly smart transport as a core element of the global age-friendly cities programme that comprises mobility practices, digital data, digital networks, material/physical geographies and digital devices and access; and to introduce the term “mobility digital ecosystem” to describe this framework. The paper uses the method of a narrative literature review to weave together a selected range of perspectives from communications, transport, and mobility studies in order to introduce the embeddedness of both communication technology use and mobility practices into their material conditions. Combining insights from communications, mobility and transport and social gerontology with a justice perspective on ICT access and mobility, the paper then develops a framework to study age-friendly smart mobility. What we call a “mobility digital ecosystem” framework comprises five elements—mobility practices, digital data, digital networks, material geographies, digital devices and access to services. The paper contributes a justice-informed perspective that points towards a conceptualisation of age-friendly smart mobility as a core element of the age-friendly cities and communities in the WHO’s global age-friendly cities programme.

Green space exposure on mortality and cardiovascular outcomes in older adults:a systematic review and meta-analysis of observational studies.

With the launch of the "Global Age-Friendly Cities project", increasing emphasis has been placed on the effects of green spaces on health in the elderly. The previous literature has shown that green spaces are beneficial to a range of health-related outcomes in adults. However, associations of greenness with mortality and cardiovascular outcomes are less certain, which may differ depending on the age class. This review aimed to synthesize current evidence from observational studies to assess relationships of green space exposure with mortality and cardiovascular outcomes in older individuals. Five databases were searched. Qualitative evaluation and meta-analyses of included studies were conducted. This review is registered with PROSPERO, CRD42020160366. Of the 8,143 records identified, we finally included 22 studies. In a narrative systematic review, we observed that the majority of studies showed reductions in the risk of all-cause mortality and total cardiovascular disease. Further meta-analyses which included eight cohort studies, indicated that greater greenness exposure (per 0.1 unit increase of normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI)) was associated with a reduced risk of all-cause mortality (pooled hazard ratios (HR) (95% confidence interval (CI) = 0.99 (0.97, 1.00)) and stroke mortality (pooled HR (95% CI) = 0.77 (0.59, 1.00)) in older individuals. This review supports increasing green space exposure in terms of the prevention of death and cardiovascular outcomes in older individuals. Effective measures to increase or preserve greenspaces should therefore be considered as important public health interventions.

Age Friendly Cities on Active and Healthy Aging; One on Bolu-Karacasu Studio Experience

The proportion of the elderly population to the general population is increasing day by day in our country and in the world. This situation mainly affects developing countries, but there are impacts on the developed countries as well. The global aging of the world's population increases the need for services for the elderly, thus making it necessary to address the situation in terms of urban living conditions and architectural aspects. The loss of the elderly's ability to adapt to the built environment, physical and biological constraints, and spatial inadequacies are forcing older people to change the boundaries of their habitat. Within this context, the World Health Organization (WHO) is leading the way in inspiring cities to be “age-friendly” through the Global Age-Friendly Cities Guide. It develops strategies for active aging and age-friendly cities that make the best use of health, participation, and safety opportunities to improve life quality in old age. The main purpose of this study is to propose an application based on the theoretical infrastructure about the concept and requirements of the age-friendly city, which aims to create a livable and accessible environment in which the elderly can continue their lives actively and feel integrated with the society. In the scope of the study, an age-friendly city model for active and healthy aging was developed, and its results were analyzed through the Age-friendly Bolu Karacasu sample, which was created with a project in the Urban Planning Project Studio of Abant Izzet Baysal University of Bolu in 2019-2020. Keywords : Age Friendly Cities, active aging, quality of life, accessibility, Bolu Karacasu. DOI : 10.7176/JSTR/6-10-05

"Who Doesn't Think about Technology When Designing Urban Environments for Older People?" A Case Study Approach to a Proposed Extension of the WHO's Age-Friendly Cities Model.

The World Health Organization (WHO) strives to assist and inspire cities to become more “age-friendly”, and the fundamentals are included in the Global Age-Friendly Cities Guide. An age-friendly city enables residents to grow older actively within their families, neighbourhoods and civil society, and offers extensive opportunities for the participation of older people in the community. Over the decades, technology has become essential for contemporary and future societies, and even more imperative as the decades move on, given we are nearly in our third decade of the twenty-first century. Yet, technology is not explicitly considered in the 8-domain model by the WHO, which describes an age-friendly city. This paper discusses the gaps in the WHO’s age-friendly cities model in the field of technology and provides insights and recommendations for expansion of the model for application in the context of countries with a high human development index that wish to be fully age-friendly. This work is distinctive because of the proposed new age-friendly framework, and the work presented in this paper contributes to the fields of gerontology, geography urban and development, computer science, and gerontechnology.

Age-friendly cities in the Netherlands: An explorative study of facilitators and hindrances in the built environment and ageism in design

The World Health Organization (WHO) strives to assist and inspire cities to become more ‘age-friendly’ through the Global Age-Friendly Cities Guide. An age-friendly city offers a supportive environment that enables residents to grow older actively within their families, neighbourhoods and civil society, and offers extensive opportunities for their participation in the community. In the attempts to make cities age-friendly, ageism may interact with these developments. The goal of this study was to investigate the extent to which features of age-friendly cities, both facilitators and hindrances, are visible in the city scape of the Dutch municipalities of The Hague and Zoetermeer and whether or not ageism is manifested explicitly or implicitly. A qualitative photoproduction study based on the Checklist of Essential Features of Age-Friendly Cities was conducted in five neighbourhoods. Both municipalities have a large number of visual age-friendly features, which are manifested in five domains of the WHO model, namely Communication and information; Housing; Transportation; Community support and health services; and Outdoor spaces and buildings. Age-stereotypes, both positive and negative, can be observed in the domain of Communication and information, especially in the depiction of third agers as winners. At the same time, older people and age-friendly features are very visible in the cityscapes of both municipalities, and this is a positive expression of the changing demographics.