"maybe it’s because they haven’t had to rely on it, like that day i really needed it”:...

“Maybe it’s because they haven’t had to rely on it, like that day I really needed it”: exploring users’ interpretations of technologies designed to support health and social care

Emerging Researchers in Ageing (ERA) Conference

Mark Hawker

So much to say and so little time …• Theoretical framework:

(structural) symbolic interactionism, the life course perspective and the domestication framework (Berker et al., 2006)

• Access and recruitment: gatekeepers

• Ethical issues: competence and consent17/04/2023© The University of Sheffield

Introduction• We are living in an ageing

population, which continues to grow year-on-year

• Health and social care budgets are diminishing as part of austerity cuts

• Increasingly, technology is seen as a ‘solution’ to the issues of an ageing population

17/04/2023© The University of Sheffield

http://www.parliament.uk/business/publications/research/key-issues-for-the-new-parliament/value-for-

money-in-public-services/the-ageing-population/

Telecare systems

• Worn on the wrist or around the neck

• When activated, connects to a call monitoring centre

• Call is then triaged by the call monitoring centre operator


17/04/2023© The University of Sheffield1932

So, what’s the ‘challenging idea’?


Research design


A local telecare system SCRIPT telerehabilitation system

19 older people

Recruited via local organisations working with older people

4 stroke survivors

Recruited via the SCRIPT project

• Document review• Qualitative interviews

• Document review• Qualitative interviews• Observations of user

engagement over a period of six weeks

Theoretical reading of data Theoretical reading of data

What have I found?• Shared experiences of older people that shape their

identities and the ways in which they negotiate everyday life (e.g. ‘active’ agers)

• Appropriation of telecare systems embedded within the wider dynamics of everyday life (e.g. help and support networks)

• Multiple interpretations (or metaphors) of telecare systems• As ‘prescriptions’• As ‘safety nets’• As ‘load balancers’• As ‘currency’

• Maintenance ensures technology remains ‘active’ within everyday life17/04/2023© The University of Sheffield

Everyday life and ageing

“Well, I’m 85. And when you get to be an octogenarian you’re a candidate. You’re also … strokes, heart attacks, you name it. When you get to be in your 80s, anything can happen. And a’ve no family, a’ve no siblings, so I’m on ma own. So a’m determined, like many other people, to keep that, to keep it that way, and keep independent as long as a can. And this is all part of it, a’ll do what a can in order to be prepared.”17/04/2023© The University of Sheffield

‘Real world’ interpretations‟ A’ve had it about … two year. I was ill, I was in hospital for

about eight months. And when a came out they gave me this pendant and … I ‘ave tried it out. If I press this [button] I’ve got immediate help.

‟ Well, I got one in the first place because I live alone. And it gave me a sense of security if anything went wrong.

‟ But I weighed it up and I thought: ‘well, I need help, and I need somebody to get in’. [My neighbour] has a key. But, and if I rang [my neighbour] she would come, but, [my neighbour’s] getting older, too. I don’t feel that I ought to put that responsibility on her shoulders.


A creative use of a telecare system‟ [I got this telecare system] as a gesture to

me son and daughter I thought I’d rather have a [telecare system] than go and stay anywhere, y’know. And, er, at least that satisfied them.

‟ I would’ve been in trouble if, er, [my daughter] had come and I wasn’t wearing it! [Laughs.] I would be in trouble.


Discussion

• Telecare systems are not just functional objects but are also symbolic objects

• The meaning of telecare systems is constructed and negotiated within everyday life

• Users’ agency and identities as older people influence the extent to which they are able to negotiate the meaning of telecare systems


Bibliography• Berker, T., Hartmann, M., Punie, Y. and Ward, K. J., eds. (2006).

Domestication of media and technology. Maidenhead: Open University Press.

• Haddon, L. (2011). Domestication analysis, objects of study, and the centrality of technologies in everyday life. Canadian Journal of Communication, 36(2): 311–323.

• Mackay, H. and Gillespie, G. (1992). Extending the social shaping of technology approach: ideology and appropriation. Social Studies of Science, 22(4): 685–716.

• Oudshoorn, N. and Pinch, T., eds. (2003). How users matter: the co-construction of users and technology. Cambridge, MA, USA: The MIT Press.

• Suchman, L. A., Blomberg, J., Orr, J. E., and Trigg, R. (1999). Reconstructing technologies as social practice. American Behavioral Scientist, 43(3): 392–408.

• Williams, R. and Edge, D. (1996). The social shaping of technology. Research Policy, 25(6): 865–899.


QUESTIONS?


“Maybe it’s because they haven’t had to rely on it, like that day I really needed it”: exploring users’ interpretations of technologies designed to support health and social care

Emerging Researchers in Ageing (ERA) Conference

Mark Hawker

"maybe it’s because they haven’t had to rely on it, like that day i really needed it”:...

Health & Medicine