Re: Elderly and self identification as having a disability

Hi Jim.

My masters thesis was focused on elderly users and you can check a lot of
articles from Ginny Redish and a special protocol for usability test
created by Thea Van der Geest. I think that elderly people have some shame
to inform that they have a "inability" or physical problems but there is a
lot of things involved. Some of them on my research and usability test
blame themselves due to not accomplished tasks.

You could read more about my research on this links:
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S187705091503104X

You can see all the references in the end of the article or on ACM website:
http://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=2738062&dl=ACM&coll=DL&CFID=619986110&CFTOKEN=81835156#URLTOKEN%23

There is a lot of articles on Redish's website: http://www.redish.net/

And this document about the protocol:
Geest, T. Conducting usability studies with users who are elderly or have
disabilities, *Technical Communication*, v.53, n.1, (2006), 23--31.

On Tue, May 24, 2016 at 11:32 AM, Jim Allan <jimallan@tsbvi.edu> wrote:

> Hello,
> I have used, written, and repeated what I thought was a truism, but I
> don't recall when I first heard this ...
>
> Some/many elderly (aged) folks do not self identify as having a
> disability, they respond that they are just old and things don't work as
> well as they used to.
>
> Based on conversations with elderly relatives and others (aged and people
> in the disability field)...I found this to be true. Perhaps it was the way
> the question was asked.
>
> Be that as it may, I was trying to verify/research this truism. When I
> searched on "self identification" and other terms -- of course I found
> forms to self-identify, demographics, services, etc. all about folks who
> have self-identified.
>
> What I could not find is anything that verifies that elderly do not self
> identify because in their view they are not disabled, they are just old.
> There may other subsets of folks who would/could be considered disabled but
> for whatever reason choose not to self-identify.
>
> Do you have any insight/ideas...anything?
>
> --
> Jim Allan, Accessibility Coordinator
> Texas School for the Blind and Visually Impaired
> 1100 W. 45th St., Austin, Texas 78756
> voice 512.206.9315    fax: 512.206.9264  http://www.tsbvi.edu/
> "We shape our tools and thereafter our tools shape us." McLuhan, 1964
>