VULNERABILITY AND ENVIRONMENTAL STRESS OF OLDER ADULTS IN DEPRIVED NEIGHBOURHOODS IN THE NETHERLANDS

Marieke van der Meer, Joos Droogleever Fortuijn and Frans Thissen

Tijdschrift voor Economische en Sociale Geografie, 2008, vol. 99, issue 1, 53-64

Abstract: Recent policy rests on the assumption that it is better for older people to live independently within the community for as long as possible. A related assumption is that the local community forms a supportive context for vulnerable older people; the environment can compensate the limitations resulting from growing old. However, Lawton's ‘environmental docility hypothesis’, in which the interaction between characteristics of the environment and a person's competence is described, forms a reason to be more careful with this assumption. In a survey of 1,939 Dutch older adults carried out in 2002–2003 this hypothesis is explored for older people living in deprived and non‐deprived neighbourhoods. The results of the analysis seem to be in line with Lawton's hypothesis. In non‐deprived neighbourhoods, no differences in environmental stress are found between vulnerable and non‐vulnerable older adults, while in deprived neighbourhoods vulnerable older adults experience significantly higher levels of environmental stress than non‐vulnerable older adults.

Date: 2008
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Downloads: (external link)
https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9663.2008.00439.x

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:bla:tvecsg:v:99:y:2008:i:1:p:53-64

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.blackwell ... bs.asp?ref=0040-747X

Access Statistics for this article

Tijdschrift voor Economische en Sociale Geografie is currently edited by Jan van Weesep

More articles in Tijdschrift voor Economische en Sociale Geografie from Royal Dutch Geographical Society KNAG
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Wiley Content Delivery ().