Why have some older people not adopted Internet?

[SparklyNewMe]

My parents have embraced it naturally somehow, and DM is very active on SM.
PIL have not - similar ages but always scoffed at it as if it was devil’s work. No smartphones. Both were switched on and active in olde age. MIL is on her own now, dependent on DH and BIL for all admin, and simpler things she deals with on her own like finding opening times are harder. But it was 100% choice, not inability, to adopt it, as MIL went to college in her 60s to learn Microsoft Office and has been using Word and Excel for her hobby. But email or internet - dismissed completely.

My mum does this too, but deep down I think she's embarrassed that she can't do it.

She had a mobile phone but never used it, because she just couldn't work out how to use it. When we I tried to call her it was always switched off. She'd only switch it on if she wanted to make a call 🙈 she thought that's what you were meant to do.

Her joking about it is her way of covering up that she knows she can't do it/doesn't understand it.

It's really not a stubborn refusal for people over 80 to not use the internet or a mobile phone.

My mum is in her mid 80s and has never used a laptop or a smartphone. She has never 'dabbled' as she's never needed to. She has a very traditional role in her marriage and her husband does all the admin.

I'm not saying that's a good thing, but she's not being stubborn it's just not on her radar.

yeah so that's fine then.....

I didn't mention your mother or respond to you specifically so not really sure why the "as I've said previously"?

Yes my dm has never bothered with technology at all but now we are in the position where she is widowed, housebound and extremely isolated. She genuinely could not pay a bill without me to do it and I do worry that if I was suddenly stricken down she would literally starve as she would have no way of getting food. Dramatic but true.

Similar although not quite as bad - DM, also housebound, will use the telephone to pay bills and gets food via Ocado order which me or DBro place for her, and via Meals on Wheels who give her a paper ticksheet every month.

Wiltshire Farms have paper catalogues, you can phone up for them. Then someone chooses the frozen ready meals they want and phones up to place an order and pay. The person delivering will even put them in your freezer if needed.

You're saying this, but there will be things that your children can do now that you can't, that will become the norm, and you'll be the old person struggling to keep up. I promise you.

Also you seem to lose your capability from recent back to ancient.

DM can still use her address book, write letters, address envelopes, even though she’s not done those things for years.
More recent skills like using a touch screen, emails, texts etc she’s losing her ability. It’s hit and miss whether she’d manage it. They end up stuck in the drafts folder, or with miscopied addresses etc

Late learned skills leave very fast in comparison so things we learned and practiced for decades.

And clothing firms catering to older people like Cotton Traders do paper catalogues and phone orders.

Surely the bigger problem is being housebound and not having anyone but you to check up on her? You could get an emergency button for her, and/or ensure that someone like a neighbour looks out for her or calls on her regularly. Or maybe she needs sheltered accommodation. Sometimes an elderly couple together can cope where one alone can't, they support each other and fill in for each other's disabilities. It doesn't sound as if the Internet as such is the real issue.

My father who even tried voice dictation software at one stage (as a doctor) was bought a computer when old but he had dementia by then so could never use it. it is possible had he been bought a tablet instead he might have had more luck with it.

I don't usually take my mobile out when I go out as I cannot be bothered and don't need it. That is becoming more and more unusual. If I go out for a whole day I would however take it with me.

Indeed. A 85 year old concert pianist may still be quite capable of playing a Rachmaninov concerto from memory but quite unable to master using a mobile phone.
there is no doubt that playing Rachmaninov is far more demanding than making a phone call

Yes! Even when my mum's dementia was really starting to get a grip, she still managed to write letters to me, buy stamps and post them (even though she saw me almost every day😆) She could also call me from her landline which required her to look up her contacts book. But could she remember how to use the basic little Nokia mobile phone she had been happily texting on for several years? No chance. It would have been so helpful if she could text, but her brain had jettisoned that particular skill in favour of longer standing ones.

You’re assuming that everyone who ‘refuses’ to use the internet is impacting selfishly on the lives of those around them. I’m just pointing out that there are still people who manage to live perfectly full lives offline.

I'd love to see young people today navigate across three continents with paper maps as I did. I do think my generation had much better problem-solving skills than the youth of today. The internet does so much for people that many have lost the ability to figure things out for themselves.

Usually they don't embrace it as they don't trust it or find it hard to understand how to use the technology which accesses the internet. My mum is almost 90 and can use a smart phone/ipad and laptop but struggles to make her brain work fast enough to sort out 2 stage verification on some websites although she can order groceries etc online. She has handed managing her finances over to me as she struggles to grasp anything but the most basic online banking. I can understand why some find it difficult as thought processes take longer as you age.

I don’t think any generation has better problem-solving skills than any other. Things are perhaps done in a different way, but that doesn't mean one way is better than another,

I think that on paper, not adopting the internet sounds fine - and it'd be nice to easily have that option In practice however, it's probably not the best idea and I'll probably similarly have to embrace some new technology at an age when I'm just not interested. Because so much of our daily life is on the internet now - as you point out OP you have to do Admin for her.

It's a bit like not learning to drive and then being reliant on taxis, or family / friends for lifts forevermore. Internet is kind of essential in many areas.

It bugs me. It would be good to be able to do without completely if you want to, but that is just the way the world is at present.

@SueSuddio But some people can not drive for medical reasons. Just as some people can not use phones or laptops for medical reasons.

Not to mention cooking just about everything from scratch, using virtually all seasonal, locally grown food.

And being able to knit and dressmake* (most women did not so very long ago) because it was cheaper to make clothes than to buy them.
Of course the opposite is true now.

When I started school, we were all expected to wear an overall to keep our clothes clean. They weren’t available to buy - it was taken for granted that mothers* would be able to make them from the specified Butterick pattern.
*or at least get their own mothers to make them.

Isn't the old saying, "necessity is the mother of invention". Those things you mention were done because they had to be done, there was no alternative. You learned to cook because you'd starve if you didn't! Same with sewing etc. Most youngsters today could do all that if they had to.

The issue is the people who "can do" things but because they don't "need to" do things, simply can't be arsed. That includes younger people, just as much as it includes middle aged and older people who are capable of adapting to modern tech, but just can't be bothered to try. Funny how more and more people suddenly find themselves able to use internet shopping apps, attraction ticket booking apps, banking and parking apps, when they "need to", i.e. when it suits them!

@taxguru I struggle with parking apps. Some are so poor.

My mum is 78 and had email and a computer at work in her last few working years. I think the generation of non internet old people must be a dying breed.

Yes I do wonder about communication skills in years to come. There's an advert at the moment where an office worker writes a short badly worded email to a work colleague and an app changes it to read professionally. Computers seem to be replacing the human brain.

Lots of people have never used a computer at work before they retired as they did not have office jobs.