%0 Journal Article
%@ 2561-7605
%I JMIR Publications
%V 8
%N 
%P e67242
%T Factors Influencing Older Adults’ Perception of the Age-Friendliness of Their Environment and the Impact of Loneliness, Technology Use, and Mobility: Quantitative Analysis
%A Balki,Eric
%A Hayes,Niall
%A Holland,Carol
%+ Department of Health Research, Faculty of Health and Medicine, Lancaster University, Health Innovation One, Sir John Fisher Dr, Bailrigg, Lancaster, LA1 4AT, United Kingdom, 44 1524 65201, e.balki@lancaster.ac.uk
%K COVID-19
%K age-friendliness of environments
%K physical isolation
%K digital communication technologies
%K loneliness
%K cross-sectional
%K WHO
%K World Health Organization
%K older adults
%K reduced mobility
%K age friendliness of environments
%K adult well-being
%K social connections
%K aging in place
%K life-space mobility
%K LSE
%K functional mobility
%K UCLA loneliness scale
%K age-friendly environment assessment tool
%K AFEAT
%D 2025
%7 6.5.2025
%9 Original Paper
%J JMIR Aging
%G English
%X Background: The World Health Organization’s (WHO) publication on age-friendly environments (AFEs) imagines future cities to become more age-friendly to harness the latent potential of older adults, especially those who have restricted mobility. AFE has important implications for older adults in maintaining social connections, independence, and successful aging-in-place. However, technology is notably absent in the 8 intersecting domains of AFEs that the WHO imagines improve older adult well-being, and we investigated whether technology should form a ninth domain. While mobility was severely restricted, the COVID-19 pandemic provided an opportunity to test how older adults’ perceptions of their AFE changed and what role technology was playing. Objective: This study examined how life-space mobility (LSM), a concept for assessing patterns of functional mobility over time, and loneliness impacted perceived AFEs and the moderating effect of technology. It also explores whether technology should play a greater role as the ninth domain of the WHO’s imagination of the AFE of the future. Methods: In this cross-sectional quantitative observation study, data from 92 older adults aged 65-89 years were collected in England from March 2020 to June 2021 during the COVID-19 pandemic. The Life-space Questionnaire, Technology Experience Questionnaire, UCLA (University of California, Los Angeles) Loneliness Scale, and age-friendly environment assessment tool were used. Correlation and moderation analyses were used to investigate relationships between variables. Results: Most participants (86/92, 93%) had not left their immediate town in the previous 4 weeks before the interview. Restricted LSM was positively correlated to the age-friendly environment assessment tool, that is, rising physical isolation was linked to a better perception of AFEs; however, we discovered this result was due to the moderating impact of increased use of technology, and that restricted LSM actually had a negative effect on AFEs. Loneliness was correlated negatively with the perception of AFEs, but technology use was found to moderate the impact of loneliness. Conclusions: Pandemic-related LSM restrictions impacted perceived AFEs and loneliness negatively, but technology played a moderating role. The findings demonstrate that technology could be considered as a ninth domain in the WHO’s assessment of AFEs for older adults and that there is a need for its explicit acknowledgment. 
%R 10.2196/67242
%U https://aging.jmir.org/2025/1/e67242
%U https://doi.org/10.2196/67242