Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-jkksz Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-23T17:43:53.089Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Eating and ageing in rural Australia: applying temporal perspectives from phenomenology to uncover meanings in older adults’ experiences

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 December 2015

ALEXANDRA CLARE KING ,
PETER ORPIN ,
JESSICA WOODROFFE  and
KIM BOYER
ALEXANDRA CLARE KING*
Affiliation:
Centre for Rural Health, University of Tasmania, Hobart, Australia.
PETER ORPIN
Affiliation:
Centre for Rural Health, University of Tasmania, Hobart, Australia.
JESSICA WOODROFFE
Affiliation:
Centre for Rural Health, University of Tasmania, Hobart, Australia. Launceston Clinical School, University of Tasmania, Launceston, Australia.
KIM BOYER
Affiliation:
Centre for Rural Health, University of Tasmania, Hobart, Australia.
*
Address for correspondence: Alexandra C King, Faculty of Health, University of Tasmania, Private Bag 103, Hobart, TAS 7001, Australia E-mail: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Nutritious and enjoyable eating experiences are important for the health and wellbeing of older adults. Social gerontology has usefully engaged with the role of time in older adults’ eating lives, considering how routines and other temporal patterns shape experiences of food, meals and eating. Building on this foundation, the paper details one set of findings from qualitative doctoral research into older adults’ experiences of food, meals and eating. Informed by phenomenological ethnography, it engages with one of four dimensions of the human lifeworld – the temporal dimension. The research involved repeated in-depth interviews, walking interviews and observation with 21 participants aged 72–90 years, living in rural Tasmania, Australia. The temporal elements of older adults’ experiences are detailed in terms of the past, present and future. The findings show that older adults have vivid memories of eating in uncertain and austere times, and these experiences have informed their food values and behaviours into old age. In the present, older adults employ several strategies for living and eating well. Simultaneously, they are oriented towards their uncertain eating futures. These findings reveal the implicit meanings in older adults’ temporal experiences of food, meals and eating, highlighting the importance of understanding older adults’ lifeworlds, and their orientation towards the future, for developing effective responses to concerns about food and eating in this age group.

Keywords

foodeatingageingolder adultsphenomenology
Type
Articles
Information
Ageing & Society , Volume 37 , Issue 4 , April 2017 , pp. 753 - 776
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2015 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Atchley, R. C. 1989. A continuity theory of normal aging. The Gerontologist, 29, 2, 183–90.Google Scholar
Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) 2014. 2011 Census QuickStats – Tasmania. Available online at http://www.censusdata.abs.gov.au/census_services/getproduct/census/2011/quickstat/6?opendocument&navpos=95 [Accessed 21 October 2014].Google Scholar
Baars, J. 2012. Aging and the Art of Living. Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore, Maryland.Google Scholar
Backman, J. 2005. Divine and mortal motivation: on the movement of life in Aristotle and Heidegger. Continental Philosophy Review, 38, 3/4, 241–61.Google Scholar
Becker, C. S. 1992. Living and Relating: An Introduction to Phenomenology. Sage, Newbury Park, California.Google Scholar
Bengtson, V. L., Elder, G. H. and Putney, N. M. 2005. The lifecourse perspective on ageing: linked lives, timing and history. In Johnson, M. L. (ed.), The Cambridge Handbook of Age and Ageing. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 493–501.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brownie, S. and Coutts, R. 2013. Older Australians’ perceptions and practices in relation to a healthy diet for old age: a qualitative study. Journal of Nutrition, Health & Aging, 17, 2, 125–9.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Burns, C. 2009. Seeing food through older eyes: the cultural implications of dealing with nutritional issues in aged and ageing. Nutrition & Dietetics, 66, 4, 200–1.Google Scholar
Daniels, D. 2006. Poverty. In Alexander, A. (ed.), The Companion to Tasmanian History, Centre for Tasmanian Historical Studies, University of Tasmania. Available online at http://www.utas.edu.au/library/companion_to_tasmanian_history/P/Poverty.htm [Accessed 23 October 2014].Google Scholar
De Witt, L., Ploeg, J. and Black, M. 2010. Living alone with dementia: an interpretive phenomenological study with older women. Journal of Advanced Nursing, 66, 8, 1698–707.Google Scholar
Department of Health and Human Services 2014. Report on the Tasmanian Population Health Survey. Government of Tasmania, Hobart, Australia.Google Scholar
Desjarlais, R. and Throop, C. J. 2011. Phenomenological approaches in anthropology. Annual Review of Anthropology, 40, 1, 87–102.Google Scholar
Devine, C. M. 2005. A life course perspective: understanding food choices in time, social location, and history. Journal of Nutrition Education & Behavior, 37, 3, 121–8.Google Scholar
Evans, J. and Jones, P. 2011. The walking interview: methodology, mobility and place. Applied Geography, 31, 2, 849–58.Google Scholar
Frykman, J. and Gilje, N. 2003. Being there: an introduction. In Frykman, J. and Gilje, N. (eds), Being There: New Perspectives on Phenomenology and the Analysis of Culture. Nordic Academic Press, Lund, Sweden, 7–51.Google Scholar
Garcia, C. M., Eisenberg, M. E., Frerich, E. A., Lechner, K. E. and Lust, K. 2012. Conducting go-along interviews to understand context and promote health. Qualitative Health Research, 22, 10, 1395–403.Google Scholar
Giddens, A. 1991. Modernity and Self-identity: Self and Society in the Late Modern Age. Polity Press, Cambridge.Google Scholar
Heidegger, M. 1962. Being and Time. Translators Macquarrie, J. and Robinson, E., Blackwell, Oxford.Google Scholar
Herscovitch, A. and Stanton, D. 2008. History of social security in Australia. Family Matters: Journal of the Australian Institute of Family Studies, 80, 51–60.Google Scholar
Higgs, P., Hyde, M., Gilleard, C., Victor, C., Wiggins, R. and Jones, I. R. 2009. From passive to active consumers? Later life consumption in the UK from 1968–2005. The Sociological Review, 57, 1, 102–24.Google Scholar
Husserl, E. 1970. The Crisis of European Sciences and Transcendental Phenomenology. Translator Carr, D., Northwestern University Press, Evanston, Illinois.Google Scholar
Ilmonen, K. 2001. Sociology, consumption and routine. In Gronow, J. and Warde, A. (eds), Ordinary Consumption. Routledge, London, 9–23.Google Scholar
Jastran, M. M., Bisogni, C. A., Sobal, J., Blake, C. and Devine, C. M. 2009. Eating routines. Embedded, value based, modifiable, and reflective. Appetite , 52, 1, 127–36.Google ScholarPubMed
King, A. C. 2014. Food security and insecurity in older adults: a phenomenological ethnographic study. Unpublished doctoral thesis, University of Tasmania, Hobart, Australia.Google Scholar
Kusenbach, M. 2003. Street phenomenology: the go-along as ethnographic research tool. Ethnography, 4, 3, 455–85.Google Scholar
Lund, T. B. and Gronow, J. 2014. Destructuration or continuity? The daily rhythm of eating in Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden in 1997 and 2012. Appetite, 82, 143–53.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Lundkvist, P., Fjellström, C., Sidenvall, B., Lumbers, M. and Raats, M. 2010. Management of healthy eating in everyday life among senior Europeans. Appetite, 55, 3, 616–22.Google Scholar
Maguire, M., Peace, S., Nicolle, C., Marshall, R., Sims, R., Percival, J. and Lawton, C. 2014. Kitchen living in later life: exploring ergonomic problems, coping strategies and design solutions. International Journal of Design, 8, 1, 73–91.Google Scholar
Mitzen, J. 2006. Ontological security in world politics: state identity and the security dilemma. European Journal of International Relations, 12, 3, 341–70.Google Scholar
Quandt, S. A., Vitolins, M. Z., DeWalt, K. M. and Roos, G. M. 1997. Meal patterns of older adults in rural communities: life course analysis and implications for undernutrition. Journal of Applied Gerontology, 16, 2, 152–71.Google Scholar
Quéniart, A. and Charpentier, M. 2012. Older women and their representations of old age: a qualitative analysis. Ageing & Society, 32, 6, 983–1007.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Riley, M. 2010. Emplacing the research encounter: exploring farm life histories. Qualitative Inquiry, 16, 8, 651–62.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schafer, M. H., Mustillo, S. A. and Ferraro, K. F. 2013. Age and the tenses of life satisfaction. Journals of Gerontology: Psychological Sciences and Social Sciences, 68B, 4, 571–9.Google Scholar
Schutz, A. 1973. The Structures of the Life-world. Volume 1, Northwestern University Press, Evanston, Illinois.Google Scholar
Smith, J. A., Flowers, P. and Larkin, M. 2009. Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis: Theory, Method and Research. Sage, London.Google Scholar
Southerton, D. 2013. Habits, routines and temporalities of consumption: from individual behaviours to the reproduction of everyday practices. Time & Society, 22, 3, 335–55.Google Scholar
Southerton, D., Díaz-Méndez, C. and Warde, A. 2012. Behavioural change and the temporal ordering of eating practices: a UK–Spain comparison. International Journal of Sociology of Agriculture and Food, 19, 1, 19–36.Google Scholar
Sydner, Y., Sidenvall, B., Fjellstrom, C., Raats, M. and Lumbers, M. 2007. Food habits and foodwork: the life course perspective of senior Europeans. Food, Culture & Society, 10, 3, 368–87.Google Scholar
Sylvie, A. K., Jiang, Q. and Cohen, N. 2013. Identification of environmental supports for healthy eating in older adults. Journal of Nutrition in Gerontology and Geriatrics, 32, 2, 161–74.Google Scholar
Thompson, J. L., Peace, S., Astell, A., Moynihan, P. and Macdonald, A. 2014. Food environments: from home to hospital. In Walker, A. (ed.), The New Science of Ageing. Policy Press, Bristol, UK, 155–80.Google Scholar
Todres, L. and Galvin, K. 2010. ‘Dwelling-mobility’: an existential theory of well-being. International Journal of Qualitative Studies on Health and Well-being, 5, 3.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Townsend, J., Godfrey, M. and Denby, T. 2006. Heroines, villains and victims: older people's perceptions of others. Ageing & Society, 26, 6, 883–900.Google Scholar
van Manen, M. 1997. Researching Lived Experience: Human Science for an Action Sensitive Pedagogy. State University of New York Press, London, Ontario, Canada.Google Scholar
Vesnaver, E. and Keller, H. H. 2011. Social influences and eating behavior in later life: a review. Journal of Nutrition in Gerontology and Geriatrics, 30, 1, 2–23.Google Scholar
Wagner, H. R. 1970. Introduction. In Wagner, H. R. (ed), Alfred Schutz on Phenomenology and Social Relations: Selected Writings. The University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1–50.Google Scholar
Wethington, E. and Johnson-Askew, W. L. 2009. Contributions of the life course perspective to research on food decision making. Annals of Behavioral Medicine, 38, supplement 1, S74–80.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Willen, S. S. and Seeman, D. 2012. Introduction: experience and inquiétude. Ethos, 40, 1, 1–23.Google Scholar