Borrow Request for Grandmother's Smartphone
In France, efforts to bridge the digital divide among seniors are multifaceted, encompassing policy-level funding and planning, state-driven improvements in public digital services, and community-led initiatives to enhance digital skills and autonomy tailored for older adults.
The French government's Digital Inclusion Action Plan, adopted in 2017, includes the Digital Inclusion Pact and establishes funding programs for local projects targeting digital exclusion, including among seniors. Community-focused initiatives aim to reduce the digital divide by improving seniors' autonomy with digital tasks such as online banking, medical appointments, and communicating with family.
Strategies prioritize providing user-centered digital services and accessibility, often promoting easy-to-read language and simplified interfaces for seniors to facilitate digital use. These initiatives align with the European Union’s Digital Decade Policy, which aims to ensure universal access and support community networks, indirectly benefiting older adults by improving rural and underserved connectivity.
Addressing barriers like lack of digital literacy and motivation, community informatics approaches advocate for effective use of information and communication technologies (ICTs) rather than mere access, ensuring seniors have the skills and support for meaningful digital engagement.
Solutions such as facilitating equipment access, reducing white zones, and training unconnected populations are being explored to promote digital inclusion of seniors. While those aged 60-69 are quite well-equipped (with 90% having internet access at home), the situation becomes more complex for older individuals due to factors like lack of equipment, solitude, and fear of making mistakes.
Digital insecurity, especially data breaches, is a concern that discourages seniors from adopting digital tools. According to a recent survey, 9 out of 10 French people have already been victims of a cyber threat. Some digital activities remain inaccessible to seniors, such as buying a train ticket, managing a bank account, making a medical appointment, organizing leisure activities, and completing administrative tasks.
Initiation workshops to digital are offered across France by various associations, and seniors are increasingly using smartphones over computers to access the internet and watch video content. E-commerce plays a significant role in the uses of digital tools among seniors, with seniors using digital tools for entertainment, education, and making connections on dedicated applications.
Seniors' use of social networks, particularly Facebook, has been growing in recent years, with 58% of seniors in France now connected to social networks. Instant messaging services like Messenger and WhatsApp are also popular among seniors. Notable examples of seniors embracing digital platforms include Sophie Fontanel, a French journalist with 393K Instagram followers, and Helen Van Winkle, aged 96, who has over 3 million followers on Instagram.
In France, seniors represent approximately 15 million people, accounting for 27.7% of the population. The most connected seniors are typically the most at ease and use digital tools for various tasks, often through numerous applications. Digital buses are traveling in certain regions to raise awareness about digital use, and e-commerce plays a significant role in the uses of digital tools among seniors.
Despite the challenges, France's approach to bridging the digital divide among seniors demonstrates a commitment to ensuring older adults can fully participate in the digital age.
- The French government's Digital Inclusion Action Plan, encompassing initiatives like the Digital Inclusion Pact and funding programs for local projects, aims to foster science and technology use, particularly in education-and-self-development areas, to help seniors improve their digital skills and autonomy.
- In the realm of health-and-wellness, seniors are utilizing digital tools for managing medical appointments and banking online, demonstrating the benefits of these technologies in enhancing their lifestyle.
- With the increasing use of smartphones among seniors for e-commerce, entertainment, and social networking, the digital divide in France is gradually narrowing, indicating a shift towards a more connected society that appreciates the advantages of the modern lifestyle.
