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Living and eating on a shoestring in old age

An elderly woman is sitting at the table in front of a plate of soup.
© istockphoto.com/Dmitry Berkut

Participatory research towards improvement

The number of people at risk of poverty in Germany is increasing. Their living conditions are often characterised by poorer nutritional status and overall health, less favourable housing conditions and less social participation. In the case of older people, this is exacerbated by the fact that they have almost no means of recovering from poverty. Improving their situation is thus of great relevance to society.

This is where the research project “ELSinA - Ernährungs- und Lebenssituation von Seniorinnen und Senioren in Armut” (Nutritional situation and living conditions of senior citizens in poverty) comes in. ELSinA is co-creating a plan of action to improve the nutritional situation and living conditions. The project focuses on changing the circumstances of life of senior citizens living in financial poverty in private households. However, the ambition of ELSinA to trigger change is not easy, because nutritional situations and living conditions are shaped by diverse, far-reaching influencing factors and their interactions. In order to make changes, the various interests, goals, participation options and expertise of those stakeholders involved must be considered. Consequently, in the ELSinA project, a transformation-oriented approach is being used which meets these challenges. The approach was developed by MRI’s Institute of Nutritional Behaviour and combines empirical social research, systems science and transdisciplinarity.

Figure 1 presents the general approach adopted by ELSinA

This figure is a visualisation of the appraoch and groups of stakeholders involved in the ELSinA research project. The project begins with two steps to investigate people’s personal nutritional situation and living condition involving scientists and senior citizens in poverty. Step 1 uses the method photovoice, step 2 interview and questionnaire. Step 3 identifies urgent needs for change and involves scientists, senior citizens in poverty and social organisations. The method is known as Future Workshop. From Step 4 onwards, additional groups of stakeholders are integrated, including stakeholders of business, civil society and politics. In Step 4.1 an understanding of the system is created and in Step 4.2 leverage points for achieving improvements are identified. Both steps use participatory modelling. In Step 5 innovation teams develop a plan of action.
© MRI, Microsoft / Figure 1: Approach and groups of stakeholders involved in the ELSinA research project (own presentation )