Paper short abstract:

Current rationalities of health and age motivate elderly to a vital usage of home-based digital technologies for treatment, diagnosis and surveillance. An empirical pilot study examines the doing of health and age, the pre-scripted ageism and the contributions to social inequalities.

Paper long abstract:

Following the concept of biomedicalization (Clarke et al. 2003), contemporary life is marked by a privatization of and responsibilization for health care, while progressively relaying on technological applications for treatment, diagnosis and surveillance. This inheres the idealization of young and abled bodies, which calls on the activation of the individual for retaining youthfulness (Joyce & Mamo 2006). Accordingly the aged body is envisioned as a side for continual improvement at best or a set of age-related (pre-)diseases at worst. As a consequence digital home-based technologies designed to improve health enjoy great popularity with (most) elderly.

Thus, my pilot study, situated at the junction of Sociology of Health, Aging Studies and STS, is concerned about four corresponding aspects: (1) A survey is done on digital home-based devices to improve health and to continue active living at homes of the elderly. It is emphasized on how elderly negotiate with the devices, follow, modify, or resist their inscribed purposes. (2) Age as well as health are conceptualized as contingent social phenomena. By using the concept of doing age and health (Butler 1995), both are grasped as being generated by performativity. Based upon this, the embodied, lived experience of both will be approached. (3) In terms of STS, the interest lies upon the pre-scripted ageism in the design and diffusion of those technologies (Akrich 1992). (4) Finally it is questioned how those technologies redefine or reconfigure aging and health, how therewith technoscience contributes to inequalities of social positions, based on age, gender and class.