Idea 1 - Inspired by the research made into nostalgia and how it can counteract loneliness, boredom and anxiety, this idea focuses on organising nostalgic events for the elderly. Working with a reputable existing charity that has sufficient funding, the events would aim to remind the elderly of aspects of their pasts. They would socialise with others in their community and potentially find new friends. The design resolution would be a campaign to aware the elderly about the service. This would be advertised on television and in local newspapers.
Idea 2 - Inspired by the elderly who are physically unable to get out of the house, this idea focuses on creating a pen-pal charity that sends elderly people weekly community newsletters and letters from other elderly people. It would be a free service for elderly that uses freepost. Funding for this would be from donations or through working with an existing organisation/local authority.
Idea 3 - Informed by the analysis of awareness posters and how there is a trend in sad, isolated photographic imagery, this idea focuses on producing an elderly loneliness campaign that uses positive imagery and messages. This would work with another idea to ensure that elderly loneliness is promoted and combatted.
Idea 4 - The final idea has been inspired by today's technology, and how people aged 65-74 in the UK are increasingly connected, with four in ten using a smartphone (Ofcom, 2017). The concept is to create an application that connects elderly people in a community, almost like a local Skype or FaceTime service. This would be free to download and locally promoted throughout community workshops and leaflets.
I presented these ideas to three different age groups - people my age, middle aged parents and elderly family I am in contact with. Getting feedback from all three audiences has been extremely beneficial as I received a variety of perspectives on the issue. Idea 2 is the least favoured - people raised the point that elderly people would still not be getting physical human interaction, which was an aspect highlighted in the research stage as being very important. A similar view has been given to Idea 4; however, the elderly people that I spoke to do not have smartphones, which highlights that the resolution is not considering wide accessibility. For these reasons, both Idea 2 and 4 will not be developed.
Idea 1 and 3 have been voted as holding the most potential for combatting elderly loneliness; but, an extremely informative point was raised that has caused me to alter the focus of this brief. A student suggested that, for Idea 1, instead of putting on nostalgic themed events I should change the target audience to elderly and young people. The argument for this is that elderly people would feel nostalgic by meeting young people. In the research stage it was identified that intergenerational schemes could save lives among older people, whilst it is beneficial for young people’s long-term health too; therefore, a final concept will be created in the following stage of the process.
Idea 1 and 3 have been voted as holding the most potential for combatting elderly loneliness; but, an extremely informative point was raised that has caused me to alter the focus of this brief. A student suggested that, for Idea 1, instead of putting on nostalgic themed events I should change the target audience to elderly and young people. The argument for this is that elderly people would feel nostalgic by meeting young people. In the research stage it was identified that intergenerational schemes could save lives among older people, whilst it is beneficial for young people’s long-term health too; therefore, a final concept will be created in the following stage of the process.
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