• Design Convergence Study
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• v.15 no.2
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• pp.203-222
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• 2016

The age-friendly environments have the benefits that they provide not only the elderly, but also the disabled, children, pregnant, and young persons with the convenient environments. The study examined how degree the aged perceived their physical living environments were age-friendly. The data were collected from 525 old peoples living in Busan using by the person to person interview. All 34 items related to the age-friendliness of outdoor space and building, traffic, and housing were analyzed. The aged perceived that the agefriendliness of their living environments were mid-range. This implies that the improvements of their physical living environments were needed. The age-friendliness of housing area was the lowest among three areas. This means that the alternatives for improving the old persons' houses were needed. The characteristics which affected the aged' perception of the age-friendliness of physical living environments were economic level, housing type, home-ownership, and health condition.

• 한국노년학
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• v.36 no.3
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• pp.581-594
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• 2016

This study aims to observe the effect of age friendliness of cities on life satisfaction and to suggest ways to improve quality of life of older people. The secondary data sets were used in this study, which were '2014 Survey of Living Conditions and Welfare Needs of Korean Older People.' It's a nationwide data collected by the Korean Institute of Health and Social Affairs. A multilevel analysis model was used to analyze the data because the level of age friendliness has a hierarchical data structure. Results showed as follows: First, life satisfaction of older adults is affected by the level of age-friendliness of cities in which they live. Second, on the personal level, older people showed low life satisfaction when they are more older and have more chronic diseases and more depressed. On the contrary, life satisfaction of older adults increased when they have higher education and income. Third, on the city level, older people showed higher life satisfaction when they live in high employment rate area and participation rate of lifelong education. Cautions should be placed when interpret the result because the variables that represent the characteristics of age friendless of cities were constituted arbitrary. Based on the results, suggestions for improving the city environment age-friendly and implications for social welfare practice were provided.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Landscape Architecture
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• v.50 no.3
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• pp.1-18
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• 2022

Prior studies have shown positive effects of outdoor activities on the elderly's physical, mental and social health. 'Active aging' and 'age-friendly' neighborhood can be created by modifying the experiences and perceptions of the outdoor environment. This study aims to investigate the outdoor activities of the elderly living in a low-income elderly concentrated area and their perception of the neighborhood environment. We also explored the context of interactions between the facilitators and inhibitors of outdoor activities on the basis of temporal, spatial, and social conditions. We used a mixed method approach by collecting two different types of qualitative GIS data : observation maps of the main places and individual cognitive maps with in-depth interviews. The observational map analysis indicated that the preferred places and activity patterns differ by age, gender, and size of the group. The cognitive map and interviews demonstrated that the elderly's activity goals and perception of the landscape differ by places such as forests, parks, streams, open-spaces, vegetable gardens, and alleys. The elderly's desire for outdoor activities can be better fulfilled when their front doors and alleys are well-connected to an open-sight pleasant space. Familiarity is an important factor for the elderly, therefore it is important to remove the psychological and physical barriers by increasing the legibility and accessibility of places. In addition, social interactions and conflicts can have a significant influence on the elderly's occupation of space in the neighborhood environment.

• Therapeutic Science for Rehabilitation
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• v.13 no.2
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• pp.27-40
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• 2024

Objective : This study aimed to conduct a systematic review of the assessment tools used to assess the housing environment of older adults. Methods : Data were collected from January 2015 to August 31st, 2023, by searching databases including the Cochrane Library, PubMed, and ProQuest. From the 267 articles, nine assessment tools were selected for analysis based on their original instruments. These tools were categorized and systematically organized for analysis based on their frequency of use, assessment purposes, sub-domains, scales, and other relevant criteria. Results : Among the nine tools, HOME FAST and IPAQ-E were the most frequently used (20% each). The objectives of these tools are to assess friendliness, physical barriers, fall prevention, dementia-friendly environments, physical activity, and accessibility. The measurement scope encompassed various factors, such as outdoor spaces, buildings, transportation, housing, and community support. Conclusion : When considering the suitability of housing for the older adults population, providing foundational data for the rational selection of evaluation tools with logical validity is important. This includes factors such as the objectives and measurement scopes of housing environment assessment tools.

• 한국노년학
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• v.37 no.3
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• pp.669-686
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• 2017

The purpose of this study is to investigate types of neighborhood environments and to verify whether the types of neighborhood environments are directly related to life satisfaction of older adults. To achieve this goal, I used'2014 National Survey on Older Koreans' data which surveyed the older adults aged 65 and over living in the community and a total of 10,281 respondents were analyzed. To determine the types of neighborhood environment, the time taken by walking from community organizations or places such as grocery stores, medical centers, administrative agencies, welfare centers, public transportation was used as an neighborhood environment indicators. As a results, there were six types of neighborhood environment: a leisure-welfare walk-limited type(20.3%), a leisure-welfare long-distance type(15.5%), a balanced proximity type(7.8%), a store-traffic type(35.8%), a traffic proximity type(10.1%), and a marginalized area type(11.3%). Compared to the balanced proximity type, older adults living in a store-traffic type and a marginalized area type were more likely to have negative life satisfaction. older adults who have higher life satisfaction were more likely to be female, more educated, get higher household income, and have a spouses or partner. Moreover, the better the health conditions, the higher the frequency of contact with children, siblings, friends and neighbors, the higher the satisfaction of life. Finding from the study highlight the importance of neighborhood environment in late life and provide implications for building age-friendly community.