Age-friendly Enviroments

Age-friendly Environments

Person-Environment Fit and the Aging Process

Our research focuses on implications and consequences of age-related differences in person-technology transactions. This involves two key questions. First, we address the question of how technology can improve functional independence, mobility, social participation, and quality of life in older adults. Second, we investigate the circumstances under which technology is successfully embraced by older adults. Both aspects require an understanding of the adaptive transactional process of personal competence with the demands of technology. Competence here refers to age-related changes and processes in cognitive, physiological, and psychological domains and their relation to social and physical places in which aging takes place. The demands of technology refer to functionality, usability, accessibility, as well as design of products and services that address older adults. Our research projects cover both aspects in various domains of everyday life: mobility
(EMN moves), hearing aid use (HoerGut), adoption of computers, autonomy and work life.