Occupational Participation Among Older Adults During the COVID-19 Pandemic.
Samantha A Oostlander, Camille Joanisse, Michael S Mulvey and 8 others
PMID 39363638WHAT IT FOUND
Older adults' pandemic losses centred on doing things with other people, not the activities themselves; virtual versions were 'better than nothing' but rarely enough.
Some were also barred from volunteering by age rules.
Key findings
01When pandemic restrictions abruptly stopped their usual activities, participants described more boredom and restlessness, a lost sense of doing things alongside other people, a sense of 'lost' years of active life, and disrupted retirement plans.
02Technology was used for a wide range of activities, but whether it was an acceptable substitute depended on what the activity meant to the person: those seeking social connection called it 'better than nothing', while participants who played music together found the online delay made it impossible.
03Some participants could not return to in-person volunteering because organizations temporarily set age cut-offs such as 65 or 70, and adapted roles with less contact did not give them the same satisfaction.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for OTs
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What it does not show
Almost everyone who took part was white, female, living with others in Ontario and under 79, so these accounts come from a fairly well-resourced group and say little about older adults living alone, in poverty, or in other parts of Canada. Participants who used technology easily were describing access problems they saw for other older adults, not ones they had themselves, so the study does not show what digital participation is like for people who cannot afford or manage it. The two rounds of interviews were not analysed as a before-and-after comparison, so nothing here shows how individual people changed over the pandemic. This is a qualitative study reporting what people described. It cannot show that any programme, technology or service works.
Declared interests
The work was funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (grant #435-2022-0718). The authors declared no other competing interests. The research team included an older adult community member with emergency preparedness experience, a private industry advocate for older adults, doctoral candidates including the first author, and professors from law, health science, communications and business.
The easy way to misread this
Do not read the technology findings as evidence that virtual programmes fail older adults. Everyone in this sample already used technology, and the finding is about what an activity meant to the person, not about whether older adults can manage digital tools.
Summarised by AI from the full paper, without a clinician reviewing it. Check it against the source before it changes what you do. Read it on PubMed →