Student nurses' views of participating in an intergenerational café with older people

Within the context of global ageing, older people will require health care during times in their later lives. As most nurses will care for older people across a variety of care settings, it is crucial that older people and nurses can work together in partnership. In preparation for this, it is important to develop intergenerational learning innovations for student nurses and older people. An online intergenerational discussion café was developed to provide an opportunity for older people and student nurses to meet and get to know each other.

1) Evaluate the effectiveness of an intergenerational discussion café as a way of facilitating intergenerational learning, 2) Elicit participants' views on whether intergenerational learning had occurred.

Ethically approved survey research.

Tertiary education institution.

Third year student nurses (n = 50) across three BSc Nursing pre-registration degree programmes enrolled on a shared community care module.

Post-café, student nurses were invited via email to voluntarily participate in the research and to complete an anonymous online survey. Questionnaire return implied consent. Fifty student nurses (n = 50) participated in the post café survey. Descriptive statistical analysis of Likert scale quantitative data and thematic analysis of open-ended questions was undertaken.

Participants reported that the intergenerational cafés were well organised, worked well and strongly agreed that the cafés were helpful in facilitating student nurses and older people to connect socially and share views. Results also showed that participants felt they got to know a lot about older people and that they were in many ways quite similar to older people.

This study provides valuable information on the use of intergenerational cafés as a means of facilitating intergenerational learning. Findings indicate that it was a positive learning experience for participants.