Leila Joy Tayko-Cazon
Cebu Normal University, Philippines
Title: Older adults internet use for health
Biography
Biography: Leila Joy Tayko-Cazon
Abstract
Lately, internet use has been increasingly ordinary and is source of benefits concerning information, communication and health purposes. Technological improvement like all inventions has its pros and cons. Internet users can link to social media and search for data using the internet. This study examined the use of the internet for health information by older adults. The Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) was applied to determine the predictiveness of perceived use, perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use and attitude toward internet use for health information.
Purposive sampling was used to obtain 53 internet user older adults who met the eligibility criteria. A questionnaire was adapted to gather the demographic data, the frequency of internet use and physical health were collected. No similar study had been found on this topic in the Philippine setting.
Majority of the respondents are 60 years old, females, college degree holders, and have used the internet for 1-5 years to search for health information. The regression analysis reveals that age and education cannot be associated with the usefulness of internet use for health information and that usefulness of internet use for health information, ease of internet use, and magnitude of use of the internet have nothing to do with older adults' health status (α=0.05). It is suggested that this research study should be replicated on a larger sample from different settings for understanding possible relationships of other variables that may be significant predictors of the older adults’ ability to use the internet for health information.