Living in Places Where People are Old Like You - Is this a Good or a Bad Thing?
Deciding whether to age in place or move is rarely straightforward.
Many factors influence whether older persons are aging in the right place, that is, in communities, neighborhoods, buildings, and dwellings with enjoyable, accessible, and supportive features. And, older people often disagree about which attributes make for an ideal place to live.
There is no one-size-fits-all residential paradise.
One residential feature specifically deserves scrutiny. Should older persons live in places where most nearby residents or neighbors are also in their late chronological ages or instead opt for locales populated by sizable numbers of younger residents?
In academic jargon, is it more desirable for older persons to occupy age-segregated or multigenerational residential settings?
Experts and professionals hold strong and opposing opinions.
Proponents of age-segregated housing argue that their older occupants are more likely to make friends and acquaintances and enjoy positive emotional support that can counter feelings of social isolation and loneliness. Both their upbeat lifestyles and their unmet needs become more visible to the outside world.
However, advocates of multigenerational living argue that age-segregated residential settings are depressing elder ghettos and a product of ageist or discriminatory attitudes. Here the older occupants cannot enjoy mutually beneficial activities and relationships—recreational, social, and educational—with the young—they feel isolated from mainstream society.
Both positions have merit, but older persons must make their own assessments. Below we show why they are likely to respond differently.
A quick detour: What kinds of places are mainly occupied by older adults?
It is initially helpful to distinguish the five most common types of age-segregated residential settings.
We find "naturally occurring retirement communities" (NORCs) in most cities, suburbs, and rural areas. These unplanned residential congregations of older persons have unremarkable origins. Typically, persons in their 40s or higher, often with children, relocate to the same neighborhood. Then they mostly choose not to move over a twenty or thirty-year time span. Their children go off to school or work, and their neighborhood becomes populated by mainly older empty nesters.
Another version of unplanned NORCs has different demographic origins. Some apartment/condo complexes, neighborhoods, and communities acquire "word of mouth" reputations as highly desirable places for older persons to retire. It may be because of their activities—for example, a university town's lectures and cultural offerings—or their scenic, recreational, or historical attractions. Whatever the draw, these places selectively attract older persons who buy permanent or second homes, and thus they become top-heavy with those at higher chronological ages.
Some apartment buildings are made affordable through the efforts of government programs or nonprofit organizations. A subset of these rental buildings specifically targets low-income older persons as tenants. They also may offer meals, social activities, transportation, and counseling that make them even more attractive.
The private sector develops apartment, condo, single-family, and mobile home park communities to appeal to middle- and higher-income older persons seeking healthy and active lifestyles. Their draw is gated security and protective homeownership associations or a plethora of organized leisure and recreational activities—golfing, swimming and tennis facilities, art, music, investment clubs, and the increasingly popular Pickleball.
This last category includes planned senior housing developments known as independent living communities, assisted living communities, memory centers, continuing care retirement (or lifecare) communities, and nursing homes. These residential and care options target less independent and less active seniors who require housekeeping services, meals, and supportive or assisted care. They are typically affordable only to those with higher incomes, although government programs can make them available to the less economically fortunate.
The idea of living in any of these places may generate extreme like or dislike emotional responses. But before making conclusions, it is helpful to understand why older people hold very different opinions.
How Older Persons View Age-Segregated or Multigenerational Living
In 1967, a scholar named Irving Rosow (Social Integration of the Aged) suggested that older people’s attitudes towards age-segregated residential places (as opposed to multigenerational residential places) would depend on how older persons viewed their aging selves. That is, how did becoming old influence how they thought about themselves? And how did these self-images influence their relationships with others their age? Based on these self-assessments, he distinguished three "patterns of age-identification."
Integration Patterns of Age Identification (Favoring Age-Segregated Residential Settings)
These older adults like living among (integrated with) persons similar to themselves—in their appearance, activities, lifestyles, life views, and shared historical pasts. Consequently, they are favorably disposed toward living in residential settings mainly occupied by other older people.
They surround themselves by persons who can celebrate their joys and commiserate with their disappointments of getting older. They don't have to apologize for their hedonistic lifestyles or feel guilty that they are no longer full-time productive workers.
They feel comfortable sharing their life experiences and welcome opportunities for intimacy. They have a receptive ear when they lament feeling like "outsiders" in a youth-oriented society.
They are less embarrassed by their physical limitations because those around them well understand the aches and pains of aging. They can freely share their medical histories and their need to know: "So which doctor did your cataracts?" "Why did you pick this hearing aid model?" "What statin are you taking?"
Because of a higher probability that neighbors will share their anxieties about the uncertainties of late life, they can find at least someone willing to look out for them.
They also feel at ease because their neighbors typically have similar biographies. They will relate to the happy and sad stories about their adult children and grandchildren. Most will be history buffs—not because of the stuff they learned in school, but because they lived through common events and circumstances as aging adults.
They will also share both their excitement and fears about rapid technological change. "Can you help me get on Facetime, and just how does one call for an Uber ride?"
On the flip side, these persons do not miss being immersed with a younger crowd—parents raising demanding babies or young children, self-absorbed teenagers experiencing their growth pains, or hard-driving career professionals.
They are happy to avoid the loud parties of nearby college students or the insults of insensitive adolescents. They don't miss the perhaps unintentional but still demeaning and ageist elderspeak communications of younger persons—"how are you today, sweetie?"
Deviance Patterns of Age Identification (Favoring Age-Segregated Residential Settings)
This second group is also favorably disposed toward living with persons their same age but not for the same reasons. Their self-images depend on how they measure up with others.
They think less favorably about themselves when more aware of the age differences between themselves and the young.
Such comparisons draw attention to their unproductive lifestyles, old-fashioned values, technological ineptness, physical limitations, and sexual unattractiveness.
In contrast, when surrounded by older people, they don't stand out so markedly, and it is easier for them to deny their deficiencies and forget they are aging.
By similar reasoning, these seniors also think better of themselves when surrounded by persons substantially older than themselves. Then they still feel in the prime of their lives.
Dissociation Patterns of Age Identification (Favoring Multigenerational Residential Settings)
These older adults seek to dissociate themselves from others their age. Consequently, they occupy residential settings where they are surrounded by younger persons. They feel more physically alive, inspired, stimulated, and self-fulfilled when they participate in activities and share their knowledge of life with the entire age spectrum.
But other motives may be in play.
They are averse to living in places primarily populated by the old because these persons will remind them of the less desirable selves they have become. They also fear that by occupying these locales, others will automatically label them as "elderly" and, in their minds, unattractive, inactive, unwanted, and inferior.
Such negative stereotypes are stigmatizing and hurtful because they do not see themselves as old. After all, "you're only as old as you feel and act." These are probably the same persons who reject using elder discount coupons to make their products and services less expensive.
Only Part of the Story
We don't pretend that all older persons will fit neatly into these categories.
Some do not count on the friendships and acquaintances found in their immediate environs. Instead, they have established social networks outside their neighborhoods and throughout their communities. And for another group of older persons who are more reclusive and less sociable, it matters less who lives nearby.
Simple generalizations are also challenging because older persons may not react the same to all younger persons.
Babies, toddlers, grade-schoolers, tweens, teenagers, young adults, families raising children, and early and late middle-agers are members of this younger demographic.
And lastly, as our initial classification of age-segregated situations emphasized, places dominated by the old may differ profoundly. How attractive and supportive they are to older persons will depend on their other salient features.
We must also remember that some older people live in places inconsistent with their age-composition preferences.
When confronted with unmanageable physical or cognitive declines in their current homes, they may have no choice but to relocate to a senior housing development.
Similarly, low-income older persons demanding more affordable accommodations may find that their only option is a rental building occupied mainly by seniors.
Likewise, older persons may feel trapped in their multigenerational neighborhoods because appropriate and affordable residential alternatives are out of reach.
A Caveat
Even when older persons opt to live in age-segregated residential settings, they may still have robust social relationships with the young.
Irrespective of where they live, older persons can spend a little or a lot of their time—inside and outside their homes—with their grandchildren and younger friends or serve as volunteers to help young children with educational or career pursuits.
About the Author:
Stephen M. Golant, Ph.D., is a leading national speaker, author, and researcher on the housing, mobility, transportation, and long-term care needs of older adult populations. He is a Fellow of the Gerontological Society of America, a Fulbright Senior Scholar award recipient, and a Professor at the University of Florida. Golant's latest book is Aging in The Right Place, published by Health Professions Press. Contact him at [email protected]
