Rebekka Rohner

Digital literacy refers to a set of competencies related to the skilled use of computers and information technology. Low digital skills can be a barrier for older adults’ full participation in a digital society, and COVID-19 has increased this risk of social exclusion. Older adults’ digital inclusion is a complex process that consists of the interplay of structural and individual factors. The ACCESS project unwrapped the complexity of the process and developed an innovative, multilevel model that illustrates how societal, institutional, material and pedagogical aspects shape adults’ appropriation of digital literacy. A holistic model describes factors contributing to older adults’ digital literacy, acknowledging sociocultural contexts, environments, learning settings and instruction practices for learning digital literacy. Instead of seeing older adults’ reasons for learning digital skills purely as individual choice, this model recognizes the interpersonal, institutional and societal aspects that implicitly or explicitly influence older adults’ acquisition of digital literacy. The results offer a tool for stakeholders, the research community, companies, designers and other relevant stakeholders to consider digital skills and the given support. It demands diverse communication between different stakeholders about the things that should be discussed when organizing digital support in digitalized societies.

Literature has widely explored the learning processes with information and communication technology (ICT) in later life, mostly focusing on the individual learner rather than materialities—such as smartphones, notepads, and handouts. The aim of this paper is to introduce a socio-material perspective by focusing on the question: What role do materialities play in digital learning processes in later life? This paper draws upon a situation analysis of data from a qualitative multi-perspective study. Researchers conducted participatory observations of five ICT courses for older adults in Austria and semi-structured interviews with seven trainers and nine older participants (61–81 years). By identifying three social worlds (digital devices, education, and participants’ everyday lives), the findings show how ICT-learning processes are embedded in the everyday lives of older adults and include not only digital, but also everyday materialities, such as pens, paper and books. These material convoys of digital learning in later life are vital in facilitating successful technology appropriation in later life.