Getting Older People's Voices Heard: A Quantitative Study Using the Validated Italian Age-Friendly Cities and Communities Questionnaire in Venice, Verona and Palermo.

Abstract

The convergence of population ageing with urbanisation is one of the key challenges to European societies. Italy is at the forefront of this trend, as 24.1% of its population is aged 65 or above, and nearly 72% of its total population lives in urban areas. Given Italy's demographic scenario, it is important to design age-friendly policies on the national and local levels. The paper contributes to the research of this topic through a technique for analysing citywide assessment data on age-friendliness. Our study presents the process of validation for the Italian older population of a standardised tool: the Age-Friendly Cities and Communities Questionnaire. The study was conducted in three Italian cities (n = 1,213) on a representative sample of older people who were asked to rate their life in the city, following the dimensions considered essential for a community's age-friendliness by the World Health Organization. Four typologies were differentiated in the analysis, resulting in different views of older adults on their experience of living in the city, showing that people's socioeconomic status and their health situation play a role in shaping their perceptions of age-friendliness. The results highlight the importance of standardised tools for effective social policies for age-friendly cities.