UNDERSTANDING THE ENGAGEMENT PATTERNS OF SENIOR CITIZENS WITH SMARTPHONE: A CASE STUDY OF ISLAMABAD PAKISTAN

Aging is a universal phenomenon and every society has senior citizens at the age of 50 years and above, while the usage of smartphone at this age varies from society to society and individual to individual. However, the trend of using smartphone in senior citizens is increasing day by day across the globe and Pakistan is no exception to it. This study aims to explore the ways of engagement with smartphone and its facilitation provided to senior citizens. The qualitative technique was used in which in-depth interviews were conducted to collect data about demographic, practices, benefits, motives and barriers of using smartphone. Fifteen participants, aged 50 years and above, having the smartphones were interviewed using a semi-structured interview method. The interviews were conducted in Islamabad Pakistan. The results revealed that senior citizens are engaged with their smartphones for different purposes such as calls, messages, social media such as Facebook, WhatsApp, and YouTube etc. The data also shows that the senior citizens have been benefited in terms of social connectedness, information, entertainment, mobility, and online booking of different activities. Furthermore, the result also indicates some difficulties in using smartphone which are due to lack of IT literacy and weak eye sight. Keywords: Senior Citizen, Engagement patterns, Smartphone.