Mobility or physical movement contributes to health and wellbeing in later life. Most studies have focused on the contribution of outdoor mobility to active ageing, but physical and cognitive impairments restrict the mobility of many older adults. This article aims to explore the gaps in the current literature on mobility in later life, and identify required innovations in the field through laying out key areas for future research. It discusses two, largely separate, areas of research, namely on mobility patterns and mobility experiences. The first focuses on quantitative and spatial research on outdoor mobility patterns in terms of routes, timing and transport modes. The second mainly concerns qualitative research on how older adults perceive mobility in their everyday lives. This article identifies three areas for future research on mobility in later life: (a) beyond outdoor movement; (b) diversity in mobility; and (c) the role of time in mobility. To conclude, addressing these areas jointly will contribute to further unpacking the concept of mobility as meaningful practice and to integrating quantitative and qualitative methods when studying mobility in later life. This will result in policy inputs on the mobility and wellbeing of our ageing population.

Rapid demographic shifts and socio-economic changes are fuelling concerns over the inadequate supply of informal care – the most common source of care-giving for older people in China. Unmet long-term care needs, which are believed to cause numerous adverse effects on health, continue to increase. Drawing data from the 2015 wave of the China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Survey, this study explores the relationship between informal care provision and unmet long-term care needs among older people in China. We first examine the availability of informal care among older people with disabilities. We then analyse whether a higher intensity of informal care leads to lower unmet needs. Our findings suggest that the majority of older people with disabilities receive a low intensity of care, i.e. less than 80 hours per month. Besides, a higher intensity of informal care received could significantly lower the probabilities of unmet needs for the disabled older adults who have mainly instrumental activities of daily living limitations. Our study points out that informal care cannot address the needs of those who are struggling with multi-dimensional difficulties in their daily living. Our findings highlight a pressing need for the government to buttress the formal care provision and delivery systems to support both informal care-givers and disabled older people in China.

Key questions in the psychiatric understanding of elderly people are the development of psychiatric morbidity, its phenomenology in old age, the differentiation between ‘normal’ and ‘pathological’ ageing, the interrelatedness of different types of mental disorders, their relation to somatic morbidity, and their consequences in daily life. Under the hypothesis of the de-differentiation of psychopathological features in old age, the relation between depression and dementia is studied. Contrary to most gerontopsychiatric research, the Berlin Aging Study (BASE) permits an analysis of these questions in a heterogeneous and primarily non-clinical community population. Initial data from the first 360 intake assessments and the first 156 intensively studied participants of BASE are presented. Results show that, even in very old individuals, depression and dementia still exhibit clearly distinctive psychopathological features. Prevalence rates in consecutive age groups show an age-related increase for dementia but not for depression. Nevertheless dementia and depression do not seem to be fully independent, because our data indicate a masking or extinction of depressive symptoms by dementia. Finally, both disorders have a similarly significant negative impact on independence, comparable to that of somatic morbidity.

An understanding of ways in which older carers' perceptions of their marital relationship and duty to their spouse underlie adjustment to care-giving is required for the development of acceptable and efficacious services for spouse carers. With this aim we conducted qualitative interviews with 20 spouses of older people with a mental illness identified in a representative community study. While carers acknowledged distressing changes in their spouse, a history of reciprocity and intimacy emerged, comprising positive themes and perceived continuity which favourably influenced adjustment to care-giving. Those who still experience closeness in the relationship see themselves as coping and are reluctant to accept formal help. Others describe long-term unhappiness in marriage and experience feelings of entrapment in the role of carer. They require early and comprehensive services. Hypotheses regarding these themes are proposed.

The social division of welfare literature emphasises the extent to which occupational-pension provision is distributed on the basis of class and gender. As most previous commentators have at least implicitly recognised, however, a significant proportion of less advantaged people are covered. This paper argues that the patterns of access and their distributional consequences must be considered more systematically, and that in this context, the diversity of employers' pension schemes are investigated. When this is done, it emerges that in the United Kingdom, the spread of occupational provision beyond the most privileged workers means that some vulnerable individuals avoid poverty in retirement. At the same time, however, the main determinant of which less advantaged people are covered and which not is chance. While class and gender are important predictors of who receives occupational pensions, access for the disadvantaged arises mainly as an accident of an employment decision made for reasons unrelated to savings or pensions criteria. This paper argues that the implication is that unsustainable justice-based arguments are currently used by policy makers to sanction the current distribution of UK pension incomes. The paper concludes by discussing the implications of the findings for the appropriateness of recent UK policy proposals and for international debates about pension reform.

The number of older parents ageing in tandem with their adult children with intellectual disability (ID) is increasing. This unique situation calls for greater research that investigates how older parents experience this extended care-giving role, including the extent to which they are engaging in futures planning. Participants were recruited via disability service providers in South Australia. Using the theoretical perspective of hermeneutic phenomenology to understand lived experiences, semi-structured in-depth interviews were carried out with older parents (N = 17, mean age 70 years). Six offspring were living in the family home while the remainder were in supported accommodation. Main themes to emerge from the data were: (a) perpetual parenting, (b) costs and rewards and (c) planning to plan. Parents were providing care across a range of areas, regardless of whether their offspring lived at home or in supported accommodation. While aware of the need to plan for the future, most did not have a firm plan in place. Parents are providing a high level of support to their adult children with ID regardless of whether they live in supported accommodation or the family home. While some have started to think about future care arrangements, most appear unclear over what the future holds.

This study is an attempt to explore the dynamics in a group of family caregivers in a small rural setting in Sweden. Thirty-nine caregivers giving extensive help to elderly family members, who were all on the verge of institutionalisation, were interviewed. The results showed that the motives of caring were usually based on feelings of reciprocity and that the perceived burden of care was related to the proximity of the carer to the person cared for. Despite the existence of a rather well-developed system of formal care, these resources were poorly coordinated with the informal provision of care.

This paper reports the findings of a one-year qualitative investigation of the memories and activities of people with mild to moderate Alzheimer's. We observed and interviewed 58 patient-carer dyads during home visits. The progression of the dementia symptoms was documented, and information was collected on social-relational events, as well as accounts of awareness, attention and anticipation, which are often neglected in research that focuses on the activities of daily living. The participants identified problems that were important to them; those with Alzheimer's disease were aware that they were not as attentive as they once had been, that they could no longer rely upon the memory of, or consciously recollect and relive, a past experience, and that the future was more difficult to anticipate. The participants' accounts describe relationships, memories and abilities – or ‘memor-abilities’ – of a past and their effects on their present and future. Our findings differ from clinical representations of memory located solely in the individual. Instead, memories are regarded as a synergistic package of both social and individual meanings that ‘leak’ between the two. What experimental psychologists interpret as systems and processes are played out in the everyday world of people with Alzheimer's disease as contextual, bounded and interdependent states of awareness, attention and anticipation. We maintain that memory is simultaneously individual and social, and that memorabilities are shared, co-constructed events and experiences in the past, present and future.

This article uses a comprehensive theoretical framework to explain why parents send money to particular children, and examines whether intergenerational solidarity is shaped by spending on various welfare domains or provisions as a percentage of gross domestic product. The theoretical model at the level of parents and children distinguishes parental resources and children's needs as the factors most likely to influence intergenerational money transfers. Differences in state spending on various welfare domains are then used to hypothesise in which countries children with specific needs are most likely to receive a transfer. For parents we hypothesise in which countries parents with specific available resources are most likely to send a transfer. We use data from the first wave of the Survey of Health and Retirement in Europe (SHARE) to analyse the influence of welfare-state provisions on the likelihood of intergenerational transfers in ten European countries. The results indicate that, in line with our expectations, the likelihood of a transfer being made is the outcome of an intricate resolution of the resources (ability) of the parents and the needs of a child. Rather large differences between countries in money transfers were found. The results suggest that, at least with reference to cross-generational money transfers, no consistent differences by welfare state regime were found.

Multi-disciplinary and inter-disciplinary working has for long been advocated in gerontology, and sometimes contested. Although collaboration between disciplines is common practice in many areas of ageing research, much remains to be done to develop and support such work. Internationally, funding agencies, scientific associations and other stakeholders in ageing research are actively involved in establishing the methods and means to promote cross-disciplinary co-operation in the field. In the United Kingdom (UK) since the late 1990s, the statutory Research Councils with key interests in ageing and older people have been actively pursuing research programmes that feature multi-disciplinarity and inter-disciplinarity. The National Collaboration on Ageing Research (NCAR), a partnership among four of the Research Councils to stimulate cross-disciplinary collaboration, worked with scientists, funding bodies, and research users to develop approaches to multi- and inter-disciplinary research, and their work informed the New Dynamics of Ageing (NDA) Programme, a major cross-Research Council programme of multi-disciplinary research which spans the social, medical, biological and engineering sciences and the arts and humanities. Drawing on the authors' participation in these activities, this article reviews key developments in the promotion of multi-disciplinary science on ageing in the UK and highlights how this is being pursued in the NDA Programme.

Many older women reduce the amount of cooking and food preparation they do in later life. While cooking may be seen as traditionally associated with women's family roles, little is known about the impact of such reduced engagement with food on their lives. This paper presents the findings from a one-year qualitative study (Changes Around Food Experience, CAFE) of the impact of reduced contact with preparing and cooking meals from scratch for 40 women, aged 65–95 years, living in Norfolk, United Kingdom. Data were collected through semi-structured interviews, focus groups and observations. Women's reasons for reducing food-related activities included changes in health, loss of a partner or a caring role, and new patterns of socialising. Disengagement from cooking and shopping was not found to entail predominantly negative feelings, passive acceptance or searching for forms of support to re-enable more cooking from scratch. Accounts evidenced the dynamic adaptability of older women in actively managing changed relationships with food. In exploring new meal options, older women were not simply disengaging from their environments. CAFE findings linked women's engagement with their environments to how they were using formal services and, even more, to the value they placed on social engagement and being out and about. Through the connections they fostered with friends, family and community, older women actively enabled their continued involvement in their social, public and family spheres. Reduced contact with preparing and cooking meals from scratch, therefore, did not induce or imply passivity or debility in the CAFE cohort. By contrast, it involved their exploring new means of retaining what was important to them about food in the context of their lived situation and social connections with friends, family, the community and public spheres.

Translation of falls prevention evidence into practice is problematic. Understanding older adults’ views about falls prevention information could enhance delivery of falls prevention, resulting in better engagement and uptake of recommended activities. The aim of this study was to examine the views and preferences of community-dwelling older adults about seeking and receiving falls prevention information. A community forum using a modified World Café approach was conducted. Participants discussed five topic areas in small groups, under the guidance of table facilitators. Perspectives were captured on paper. Thematic analysis was conducted to identify factors that influence participants’ engagement and uptake of information. Seventy-three older adults participated in the forum covering wide-ranging preferences around falls prevention information. Personal experience was considered the key influence on an older adult's decision to initiate seeking information. While health professionals were often approached, alternative sources such as public libraries, peer educators and seniors’ organisations were also favoured as credible sources of information. Older adults proposed falls prevention information should be delivered with a positive tone, coupled with highly valued qualities of respect, empathy and time to listen to foster motivation to engage in recommended activities. Consumer-focused practical strategies were proposed to potentially improve future design, communication and dissemination of falls prevention information. This improvement could enhance engagement of messages and subsequent uptake of falls prevention recommended strategies.

Increasing numbers of people with dementia reside in single-person households, yet little is known of their experiences and priorities. This exploratory Australian study elicited perceptions of seven people with dementia living alone, regarding their domestic environment and its surroundings. The general aim was to identify unmet service needs in this vulnerable population. Drawing upon the theoretical concepts of ‘the will to mobility’ and ‘life-space’, we identified four factors of particular salience to our respondents. These were access to public space, social distance and proximity, changing meanings of space and objects, and imaginative co-presence. Participants provided useful insights into a soon-to-be-common scenario in which increased numbers of people with dementia will be living without a resident carer. The findings have implications for the development of more personalised and targeted dementia care in the domestic setting, more inclusive public planning and more extensive public education programmes.

The purpose of this study was to explore musical taste patterns in old age. Having musical tastes, defined as individual preferences for certain musical genres, has been theorised as being a relational tool, something that can be used to negotiate social situations and interpersonal exchanges with others. Taste not only helps to make sense out of the endless array of products available on the cultural menu, but is also through consumption and display a way of signalling group membership, social location, identity and self. These concepts are important throughout the lifecourse, yet relatively unexplored in later life. What are the taste patterns of older adults and how do they compare to the musical preferences of other age groups? To address these questions we analysed data from the United States national Survey of Public Participation in the Arts (SPPA), a repeated cross-sectional survey, for the years 1982, 1992 and 2002. In each year, musical tastes displayed a positive relationship with age up to 55 years of age. The results indicate that across the three survey years, at older ages there was a negative relationship between tastes and age. We offer explanations for these results using theories from the sociology of culture and social gerontology.

Care-giving research has focused on primary care-givers and relied on cross-sectional data. This approach neglects the dynamic and systemic character of care-giver networks. Our analyses address changes in care-givers and care networks over a two-year period using pooled data from the US Health and Retirement Study, 1992–2000. Based on a matrix of specific adult-child care-givers across two consecutive time-points, we assess changes in any adult-child care-giver and examine the predictors of change. A change in care-giver occurred in about two-fifths of care-giving networks. Ability to provide care based on geographical proximity, availability of alternative care-givers, and gender play primary roles in the stability of care networks. Results underline the need to shift care-giving research toward a dynamic and systemic perspective.

Inter-vivos financial transfers from older parents to their adult children are widespread in the United States. Childless people may simply make fewer transfers. On the other hand, because their giving is away from children, their decisions are more complex in that there are multiple potential targets of approximately equal attractiveness. Using data for 1996 to 2004 from the United States Health and Retirement Study, this article examines the differences between parents and childless older people in financial transfers to people other than their children. The results show that, overall, parents tend to give less than the childless to other people. However, some variation is found depending on the nature and target of the gift. Having children does not affect giving to charities but does reduce the prevalence of giving to parents, but not nearly as much as the reduction in giving to family and friends. It can therefore be concluded, first that there is little substitution between personal and impersonal transfers; secondly, that the sense of obligation to parents is not reduced by giving to charities or to children; and thirdly, that having children reduces the need to satisfy the desire for family and social ties by means of links to family and friends.

The changing nature of family life has become a major issue in contemporary Britain. Concerns that change will bring moral decline and social fragmentation are countered by a more optimistic view which focuses on a future of more equitable and flexible family ties. Research drawing on area-based data in Luton amongst older, middle-aged and younger people with experience of family change suggests that so far as inter-generational relations, caring, and transfers of family wealth are concerned, traditional attitudes towards blood ties, household independence and care and support survive alongside new step relationships. The research also suggests that although several respondents had more than one generation of experience of family change, the language of step relationships is still one which is not yet completely accepted, or one with which people feel completely at ease.

It is noteworthy that while modernisation, together with population ageing, has happened in Western countries for a rather long period of time, China must confront the challenges of an ageing population before it really becomes an advanced industrial society. Facing rapid societal changes, citizens may react differently to this process. By conducting questionnaire surveys with 445 elders in Wuhan, China, this study examines Chinese older adults' individual modernity modes and reveals its socio-demographic correlates. The results show that facing rapid changes in societal modernisation, participants have reacted differently to this process, with 23.8 per cent of Chinese older participants using an accommodation mode, 27.0 per cent using a resistance mode, 13.3 per cent using a withdrawal mode and 36.2 per cent using a coping mode. In addition, socio-demographic factors such as urban–rural residence, age, gender, socio-economic status, living arrangement and daily activities have been identified as significant correlates of Chinese older participants' individual modernity modes. It is further suggested that governments at all levels should allow for options and opportunities for older people to align themselves in the modernisation process by removing the barriers that may hinder their integration and empowerment efforts. While it is important to respect older adults' different responses in the face of modernisation, their participation in societies should be encouraged and respected by the wider society in the context of modernisation.

This study investigated the determinants of Successful Ageing (SA) in a sample of 4,151 Peruvians aged between 65 and 80 years and living in poverty. A key contribution of this study is to combine the conceptual appeal of SA to measure wellbeing in old age with the multi-dimensional poverty counting approach developed in the economic literature. This setting allows for moving beyond the dichotomy of successful and usual ageing to take advantage of the full distribution of success along a set of dimensions of wellbeing. The data are drawn from the Encuesta de Salud y Bienestar del Adulto Mayor (ESBAM) survey, which is the baseline to evaluate the non-contributory public pension programme Pension 65. Nine indicators of SA have been used to assess the dimensions of physical health, functioning, cognition, emotional health and life satisfaction. The variables associated with a higher number of satisfied indicators were male gender, younger old age, literate, employed, low food insecurity, good nutritional status, normal blood pressure, absence of disabilities, non-smoker, empowerment, good self-esteem, absence of mental disability and less frequent contact with a social network. From a policy perspective, the results of this study report a remarkably stable effect of three variables affecting SA that can be relatively easy to measure, monitor and influence by public intervention. These variables are food security, nutrition quality and self-esteem.

Although mobility in and out of intimate relationships has become more common in later life, it has been a neglected issue in social gerontology. In this article, we ask what characterises the formation of new intimate relationships in later life, and whether there are any specific conditions that separate these from relationships in earlier stages of the lifecourse. On the basis of qualitative interviews with 28 persons aged 63–91 who have established a new intimate heterosexual relationship after the age of 60 or who are dating singles, we argue that time constitutes such a central structuring condition. We discuss and theorise two aspects of time – post-(re)productive free time and remaining time – which have an important formative power on new late-in-life relationships. We argue that together these aspects form a central existential structure of ageing in many Western societies – the paradoxical condition of having lots of available free time but little time left in life – which, besides influencing new late-in-life relationships, might also be relevant to other aspects of and choices in later life.