NIH Highlighted Topic: Intergenerational Interventions to Promote Health and Reduce Risk for Chronic Disease
Introduction
Interaction among individuals from different generations can have beneficial health impacts for people of all ages. Older generations can impart wisdom, life skills, and cultural or historical knowledge to younger generations. Conversely, younger generations can bring energy, technological skills, and fresh perspectives to older generations. Multi-generation groups have been shown to enhance mutual learning, creativity, and decision-making quality.
Intergenerational interventions leverage both the benefits of interpersonal interventions, such as social facilitation and support, and the unique benefits of intergenerational interactions. Intergenerational components can enhance the acceptability, accessibility, and effectiveness of existing preventive interventions, such as chronic disease screening, lifestyle modification, preventive or prophylactic medications, and self-management regimens. Intergenerational interventions may be particularly beneficial for populations at greater risk for chronic disease but decreased access to preventive services.
This topic encourages research to develop, adapt, and/or evaluate preventive interventions that involve individuals, groups, or family members from two or more generations. Of particular interest are interventions with populations who are at elevated risk for developing chronic disease and/or less likely to receive preventive services.
Interventions should be guided by a conceptual model identifying the hypothesized mechanism(s) through which the intergenerational interaction impacts health outcomes. These hypothesized mechanisms should be explicitly measured. Research designs should account for the expected correlation in outcomes among members of the same cluster (e.g., family, nursing home, neighborhood).
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