2022 Volume 10 Issue 3 Pages 1-11
People in Japan have been living under restrictions, with limited opportunities for social contact, over a year since the nation's first state of emergency was declared in April 2020. In particular, social networks of older males in urban areas tend to be limited to those from former work and school days. As these males have lost opportunities to meet their former colleagues and friends, most of whom live far, they are expected to be hit harder by the restrictions than older females, who are more likely to have networks within the community.
Hence, this study aimed to examine adoption process of the Internet in relationships and social activities among urban corporate retirees male through narratives by eight males who had started using the Internet since before the COVID-19 pandemic.
The results show that the respondents increasingly used these tools as alternative ways to conventional forms of relationship and social activities, while also reacknowledging the value of in-person communication (【Limitations of the Internet】【Digging up familiar tools】【Trial and error of new tools】). As the life with COVID-19 continued for an extended period of time, however, they used different Internet tools depending on which type of relationship and social activities they engaged in (【Selection of tools according to the task】).
In the future, we need to explore how to prevent and address isolation while taking account of changes and diversity regarding the ways older adults use internet tools.
