Space, Identity & Control:Exploring the housing arrangements of

older people

Peter Kellett, Rose Gilroy and Sue JacksonUniversity of Newcastle upon Tyne

Background

• Proportion and numbers of older people increasing.

• Many older people have modest financial resources – housing choices constrained.

• State resources for housing and care limited

• Many families unable/unwilling to care for older relatives in their homes.

Importance of housing

• Homes help structure and manage our lives.

• Design quality and standard of home environment important for practical and social reasons – helps define our position in society.

• Older people spend more time in home environment: therefore especially critical.

Questions

• How does the size, configuration and status of the home environment impact on the self-image, identity and social roles of older people?

• How is a positive sense of self in later life related to qualities of housing space, degree of control and the coping strategies used?

Pilot study

Interviewed small sample of older people in their homes.

Range of housing situations, men and women.

Encouraged them to identify the key issues related to their housing circumstances.

Interviews recorded on tape. Photographs of home.

Five emerging themes

1. The significance of neighbourhood.

2. Adapting the home around needs.

3. The importance of space.

4. Significance of personal possessions and objects.

5. Green space, views and birdsong.

The importance of neighbourhood

• Isolation and loneliness

• The need for everyday life needs to be met within walking distance

• The importance of good public transport

• The sense of being embedded in a place

• Difficulties of keeping in contact with declining numbers of close contacts

“Well I missed the shops, I was just round the corner from all the shops … and the post office. And I had a couple of neighbours who said ‘if you ever want anything just knock.’ One gave me her phone number to ring if I needed anything, so I miss the neighbours and the shopping centre… I don’t like to think about it. You know even when I was shopping there were different old ladies who’d stop and say hello. They probably think I’ve died, you now how it is when you don’t see someone for a while, you think they’ve died.”

Mrs Duncan who recently moved into sheltered accommodation.

Adapting home around needs

• Why do people stay in their own home?• Strong wish to remain in own home if

possible.• The ability to make temporary changes.• The ability to future proof.• Problems of maintenance of house and

garden

“(Sheltered housing) would not appeal to me at all. Quite a lot of people have done that, and when I’ve talked about it with them, they say we haven’t any choice, we couldn’t get anyone to help, or maintain. If you could put those things right you wouldn’t get anyone to live in sheltered housing. Frankly the people I have spoken to are not happy.” Mary, who anticipated onset of blindness to get her home specially designed.

Importance of space

• Compression of activities into smaller spaces.

• Critical of sheltered housing stereotype: loss of privacy and control.

• Segmentation of space and time

• Importance of routines linked to particular spaces.

This is a relatively small place compared to where you were before. Did this create difficulties?

Oh yes! I never thought anyone could live in anywhere this size. …I've got a kitchen without a window, a living room with two windows but they only open this little slit. Have you ever heard of that before?

Safety reasons, perhaps?No idea. That's the design, I can't imagine. I said I shall be ill and I've been ill ever since. I've had everything.

How did you decide what to leave and what to bring? Was that difficult?Well I didn't have time to think. I brought anything small, small only. I left my three piece, everything and that was nearly new. I just left them.

Significance of personal possessions and objects.

• Furnishings and objects communicate identity and status.

• Memorabilia and mementos.

• Making choices

• The portability of home?

• Possession and pride

• Significance of display and framing

• It’s all memories of my husband and I. We had no children, so it’s just memories of my husband.

• I still think now, I wish I had kept my books. I look for a book now and think, no – it’s gone.

• All my pictures are in boxes in the cupboard. It’s as if I’m not really settled…but I am settled, so I don’t know.

Links to natural world outside

• Importance of link to outside: views

• Meaning and memories in a garden

• Trees

• Birds and birdsong

• Seeing the horizon – space beyond the home.

• So I said I would look, but I wasn’t taking it. I came in the door and saw that view. The pear tree. I couldn’t believe it… Sometimes I just sit and look out and think I’m in the park, it’s lovely. There are wood pigeons in that tree and I love to hear them cooing.

• So I know the garden is there even when I cannot see it . It’s a large garden…lot’s of trees full of lovely birds that sing away. I love it.

Significance of micro scale of environment: home, garden and possessions.

Pay attention to the stories and meanings attached to the places of older people.

The importance of the small and slow places of our lives.

Design implications for providers, managers and carers.