Socio-gerontechnology: Interdisciplinary Critical Studies of Ageing and Technology

Social change in the twenty-first century is shaped by both demographic changes associated with ageing societies and significant technological change and development. Outlining the basic principles of a new academic field, Socio-gerontechnology, this book explores common conceptual, theoretical and methodological ideas that become visible in the critical scholarship on ageing and technology at the intersection of Age Studies and Science and Technology Studies (STS).

Comprised of 15 original chapters, three commentaries and an afterword, the book explores how ageing and technology are already interconnected and constantly being intertwined in Western societies. Topics addressed cover a broad variety of socio-material domains, including care robots, the use of social media, ageing-in-place technologies, the performativity of user involvement and public consultations, dementia care and many others. Together, they provide a unique understanding of ageing and technology from a social sciences and humanities perspective and contribute to the development of new ontologies, methodologies and theories that might serve as both critique of and inspiration for policy and design.

International in scope, including contributions from the United Kingdom, Canada, the United States, Australia, Germany, Norway, Denmark, Austria, the Netherlands, Spain and Sweden, Socio-gerontechnology is an agenda-setting text that will provide an introduction for students and early career researchers as well as for more established scholars who are interested in ageing and technology.

Chapters 3, 5, and 15 of this book are freely available as downloadable Open Access PDFs at http://www.taylorfrancis.com under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives (CC-BY-NC-ND) 4.0 license.

Alexander Peine is Associate Professor of Science, Technology and Innovation Studies at Utrecht University, the Netherlands. Over the last ten years, he has developed an interdisciplinary research agenda on the use and design of technologies for older people that combines ideas from STS and Age Studies.

Barbara L. Marshall is Professor of Sociology at Trent University in Peterborough, Canada. She has written extensively on ageing, gender, sexuality and technology. Her current research explores ageing and digital technologies as these are reconfiguring embodiment and experiences of later life.

Wendy Martin is Senior Lecturer in the Department of Health Sciences, Brunel University London. Her research focuses on ageing, embodiment, and the digital and everyday life. Wendy is a member of the Executive Committee of British Society of Gerontology and Co-Editor of Routledge Handbook of Cultural Gerontology.

Louis Neven is a lector (professor) and leads the Active Ageing research group at the Caring Society Centre of Expertise of Avans University of Applied Sciences in Breda, the Netherlands. He has a long-standing interest in the design and use of technologies for older people.