Older people and the Internet

Internet  users aged 50-plus are looking both backward and forward, toward the past and the future when they surf the net, according to new US research reported by the American Association of Retired Persons (AARP).

Online growth is invalidating the notion of a “digital divide,” or “gray gap, with  boomers just as enthusiastic about the benefits of email and Web activities as their younger counterparts.

Once people are connected – and about 218 million Americans are – they seldom look back.

“I talked to a 93-year-old grandmother who never planned to go near the Internet in her life,” says Jeffrey Cole, director of the Center for the Digital Future at the USC Annenberg School for Communication in Los Angeles.

“But you send her grandson to Iraq and give her the chance to talk to him twice a day and she’ll go online in an instant. And when she does, she discovers lots of other things.”

In general those are the same practical things attracting her kids and grandkids – researching products, hobbies and medical conditions; getting driving directions; and reading the news.

But the generations do gravitate in different directions: the top categories for 55-plus are horseracing (which encompasses everything from race results to handicapping software) followed by golf, stocks and investments, travel cruises and virtual pharmacies.

One hundred per cent of users aged 50-plus report benefiting from their online communities. 

“People are saying, ‘I want to form communities irrespective of distance, I want to be connected’,” Mr Cole said. “That is one of the biggest complaints of growing older, being isolated.”