Older women, daily life and social participation. Strategies to promote Active Aging (MACTIS)
Mercè Pérez, Esther Pàrraga.

Purpose: The Active Aging framework (WHO) considers gender as one of the cross-cutting factors in the aging experience, underlying the double discrimination that suffer older women, and recommends the adoption of a gender-sensitive approach to improve AA. In our research "Older women, daily life and social participation. Strategies to promote Active Aging" (MACTIS) have been explored the conceptions and practices of elderly women related to social participation.

Method: Qualitative research including seven focus groups, with a total of fifty women aged between 60 and 85 years old, who live in Barcelona (Spain) and show heterogeneity in educational levels. The segmentation guidelines used to make the groups have been: living alone or with family and the participation or no on labour market.

Results: The focus groups showed up that women's social implication is closely related with their life course and especially with the social rules, which define the career activity as the main feminine function. This function provides sense to their lives and allows them to feel useful. That influence is recognised as much for the women who have worked outside home as for the ones that haven't. For older women, being socially active requires the adoption of a new position, deciding to take care of them selves and leading their lives. In this manner, they confront the social rule that is perceived like the main obstacle for participation and start a new lively route. The expression "Now it's my time, it's my turn" summarize their decision. The development of this decision is fixed in 3 modalities: making some activities and renouncing to others, running and doing balancing acts all the time, and establishing limits. The three cases show conciliation strategies between the self care and the care of the others. To confront the social barriers to participate it is underlined the relational dimension, fixed in 2 aspects; Firstly, the support role that women develop encouraging others and accompanying them, and, in the second place, the value of the group -activity groups-. These allow the establishment of new bonds that report acknowledgement and feed back on the new route initiated by the elderly women.

Keywords: participation, ageing, women