Gerotechnology will improve the lives of older people

By the year 2030, people over 65 will represent about 22 percent of the global population, compared with 12.5 percent today. Coupled with this changing demographic, there have also been enormous changes in technological capability.

Technology, already an integral component of everyday life, holds great promise for supporting the health and independence of the aging population.

“Gerotechnology is the application of technology to improve the lives of older adults. It creates ever-expanding entrepreneurial opportunities to develop new products and services. There are new start-ups every day from low tech applications like a better pill box to high tech ubiquitous home health monitoring,” Honglin Chen, a new Professor in Social Work at the University of Eastern Finland, points out.

In Chen’s view, domains in which technology is most likely to be useful to elders include health, living environments, communication, work, learning, and education. New products and services, like robotics and artificial intelligence, are not yet widely available on the market but hold entrepreneurial opportunities for the future.

“Clearly, opportunities exist for products and services to help elders improve their quality of life. But what’s the core element to benefit older adults with all the fast-developing technology? Besides introduction of some innovative products in senior care, I would also like to tackle the critical factor and the dilemmas from a social work and humanity aspect,” Chen says.

How do social structure and culture impact older adult life expectations?

Honglin Chen has been appointed as a Professor in Social Work, especially Gerontological Social Work at the Department of Social Sciences on the Kuopio Campus.

Chen obtained her PhD degree from the University of Hong Kong where she started her research journey into productive aging. In later years, her research interest shifted to old age care and intervention research. Her current research interests focus upon gerotechonology and evidence-based social work practice and intervention among patients with mild cognitive impairment.

“My interest in gerontological social work research stems from my field practice when I was doing my Master’s in Social Work in Minnesota in 2004, working with a diverse group of older adults. I was curious about how the lifestyles, expectations, and availability of family caregivers varied so much from the east to the west, and how social structure and culture impact older adult life expectations. This direct exposure to the lives of older adults, as well as the knowledge that population aging will be a growing issue around the world, led to my deep interest in aging and older adults,” Chen says.

Today, the hot topics of  gerontological social work research can be found, for example, in family caregiving resilience, health management, chronic illness rehabilitation and ethical issues on the use of gerotechnology to support a graceful aging and meanwhile to reduce caregiver burden. Multidisciplinary collaborations and the effectiveness of social work intervention approaches are also much discussed topics.

Equal opportunities for independent and healthy aging

Honglin Chen first got involved with the University of Eastern Finland back in 2017, when she was working in an EU Erasmus+ project called Building Bridges between Europe and China to Strengthen the Social Work Profession ,BUIBRI.

The mission of the project was to develop social work practice and education in China, and as a result of the project, she learned about research and education in social work at the University of Eastern Finland. The project was carried out under the leadership of UEF and Fudan University.

“It has become one of the most significant international education projects in the domain of social work, supported by the EU in recent years. I was the key partner in China and during the implementation process of the BUIBRI project, I got to know a few colleagues from UEF and had a very pleasant collaboration experience. I’m also attracted by the Finnish culture. I would like to work more closely with my UEF colleagues and to discover more about how culture influences happiness in later life,” Chen says.

Although aging affects us all, there are cultural differences in gerontological social work. According to Chen, Finland and China are at a different stage of developing their social work. Social issues are looked at through a very different lens because of differences in the welfare system and service delivery process, as well as cultural differences.. Chen finds that value is given life and end of life issues as well as to the ethics of practice. However, the implementation of programmes happens at a different scale and with attention to different details.

“Understanding the Finnish approach has given me insight into the practice of social work across cultures. I am excited to learn the unique models that have been fine-tuned in Finland to achieve good quality of life at later ages. It’s also a common global question for every society to discover how to keep improving the optimal practice of gerontological social work with the assistance of modern technology. As a global citizen, each of us should have an equal opportunity for independent and healthy aging.”

Working as a professor at UEF, Chen plans to develop teaching collaboration with the existing network of EU partners and Chinese universities already built by the BUIBRI project. Also, she will develop research projects with colleagues in China and at UEF.

“I have confidence and experience in working with local government and national government health departments in China, and with the help of colleagues at UEF, I’m sure this initiative will lead to a win-win story for UEF in an international and multi-disciplinary context. It will also benefit students, older adults, policy makers, practitioners, and scholars in academia in both countries.”

Honglin Chen

• Professor in Social Work, especially Gerontological Social Work, University of Eastern Finland, 1 September 2021–
• Doctor of Philosophy, University of Hong Kong, 2009.
• Master of Social Work, University of Hong Kong, 2004.

Key roles

• Assistant Dean, School of Social Development and Public Policy, Fudan University, 2019–
• Honorary Professor, School of Law and Social Work, Hexi University, China, 2019–
• General Secretary, Fuhui Social Work Affair Center, Shanghai, 2010–
• Research Fellow in Applied Social Studies, Department of Applied Social Sciences, City University of Hong Kong, 2009–2010.
• Senior research associate, University of Hong Kong, 2009.

Photo available for media usage: https://mediabank.uef.fi/A/UEF+Media+Bank/44265?encoding=UTF-8

For further information, please contact:

Honglin Chen, Professor, Department of Social Sciences, University of Eastern Finland, honglin.chen@uef.fi, tel. +358 504420209