Use of information and communication technologies improves healthy and unhealthy elderly people’s quality of life – the key role of the training setting

Abstract

The link between the use of ICT and QoL has only been recently theorized because ICT is not, per se, a correct and easy tool to improve elderly people’s QoL. We conducted a research consisting of two studies: the first one involved healthy and unhealthy seniors and the second one was a pilot study inspired by Action Research. We aimed to investigate whether elderly people’s QoL was influenced by higher beliefs, self-efficacy and positive attitudes towards ICT. Regarding the first study, most participants did not have any digital skills or only a very low level. Their perceived QoL was quite good. Their self-efficacy beliefs were very high. Their attitudes towards ICT were on the the mid-point scale. The QoL was affected by self-efficacy. In respect to the second study, data were collected before and after tests focused on improving the seniors’ digital skills. The post-training data were significantly more positive than pre-training. Self-efficacy was significantly higher after training, as was perceived QoL. The results provide evidence that seniors perceive their own lives as better than other age cohorts attribute to them. The quality of the relationship between seniors and trainers represents a main point that positively affects the QoL.

Keywords: Seniors, Information and Communication Technology, Quality of Life, Active Training, Relationship