Assessing the health impact of age-specific housing

Retirement communities have attracted much research interest from social gerontologists on both sides of the Atlantic. This paper reports on a major study which compared the tenants of a retirement community in the West Midlands, UK, with older people attending three local day-centres run by charities. The researcher for the study lived in the retirement community for six weeks, and so was able to undertake an extensive range of research activities. The findings indicate that this type of community can contribute to the maintenance of physical and mental well-being, and so may have an important role to play in future provision for older people. 16 references.