Engaging the disengaged

Amongst older adults, recent evidence suggests the most commonly stated reason for non-adoption of digital technologies is a lack of interest, rather than affordability or difficulty. This directly impacts upon the design community, both in terms of technologies we design for such groups to adopt, and the design methods we use for exploiting the untapped creativity and innovation amongst people who are not particularly interested in the outcome. This paper explores issues of technology non-acceptance amongst older adults, and reports on work designed to incorporate the values of older adults within the design process. We present the results of a series of interviews conducted with disengaged older adults, presenting the key themes found within a subset with these interviews.