UNDERSTANDING THE ENGAGEMENT PATTERNS OF SENIOR CITIZENS WITH SMARTPHONE: A CASE STUDY OF ISLAMABAD PAKISTAN

Authors

  • Obaid Khan Department of Sociology, Quaid-i-Azam University Islamabad
  • Farhan Ahmad Faiz Department of Sociology Quaid-i-Azam University Islamabad
  • Farrah Ahmed International Islamic University Islamabad

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.52567/pjsr.v3i01.186

Abstract

Aging is a universal phenomenon and every society has senior citizens at the age of 50 years and above, while the usage of smartphone at this age varies from society to society and individual to individual. However, the trend of using smartphone in senior citizens is increasing day by day across the globe and Pakistan is no exception to it. This study aims to explore the ways of engagement with smartphone and its facilitation provided to senior citizens. The qualitative technique was used in which in-depth interviews were conducted to collect data about demographic, practices, benefits, motives and barriers of using smartphone. Fifteen participants, aged 50 years and above, having the smartphones were interviewed using a semi-structured interview method. The interviews were conducted in Islamabad Pakistan. The results revealed that senior citizens are engaged with their smartphones for different purposes such as calls, messages, social media such as Facebook, WhatsApp, and YouTube etc. The data also shows that the senior citizens have been benefited in terms of social connectedness, information, entertainment, mobility, and online booking of different activities. Furthermore, the result also indicates some difficulties in using smartphone which are due to lack of IT literacy and weak eye sight.

Keywords: Senior Citizen, Engagement patterns, Smartphone.

Author Biographies

  • Obaid Khan, Department of Sociology, Quaid-i-Azam University Islamabad

    Ph.D. Scholar

  • Farhan Ahmad Faiz, Department of Sociology Quaid-i-Azam University Islamabad

    Assistant Professor

  • Farrah Ahmed, International Islamic University Islamabad

    Ph.D. scholar

Additional Files

Published

2021-03-31

Issue

Vol. 3 No. 01 (2021): Pakistan Journal of Social Research (PJSR)

Section

Research Article

License

Copyright (c) 2021 Pakistan Journal of Social Research

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Except where otherwise noted, content on this site is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.

How to Cite

[1]
“UNDERSTANDING THE ENGAGEMENT PATTERNS OF SENIOR CITIZENS WITH SMARTPHONE: A CASE STUDY OF ISLAMABAD PAKISTAN”, Pak. J, Soc. Sci., vol. 3, no. 01, pp. 48–56, Mar. 2021, doi: 10.52567/pjsr.v3i01.186.