Ageing With Nature
How Older People and Nature Keep Each Other in Good Health
On the North Sea coast older residents are embracing the ebbs and flows of ageing and nature together.
by Eva Duedahl, Bodil Stilling Blichfeldt, and Janne Liburd
A local resident, Glenn, sits with a researcher during a break in one of the ten outdoor lifestyle interventions in the Wadden Sea National Park in Denmark. He has volunteered “to do something good for yourself in nature”. They talk about what one can learn from participating in guided walks in nature.
Having pondered this, Glenn looks at the researcher and explains:
It’s fine for kids — because they don’t know anything … They get to know about nature. But us old guys, we’ve bl**** h*** been in nature on countless occasions.
This short quote is quite representative of Glenn’s understandings of nature and how nature, to him, is something rather simple that one passes through and does not dwell in.
In contrast to Glenn, Thomas, a ‘third-generation’ elder tourist in the Wadden Sea National Park, has volunteered to take one of the researchers on a guided tour to show and share his understandings of the area. As he introduces the researcher to the Wadden Sea area, he explains that it:
Puts your life in perspective and reminds you that you are nothing but a human on this planet and we need to take care of nature because we are nothing more than a tiny part of this huge puzzle.
These two quotes exemplify just how much older adults’ engagements with nature can vary. Some older adults, like Thomas, cannot wait to get out to the Wadden Sea, to yet again be reminded of how they are part of a larger, earthly puzzle. Others, such as Glenn, are more sanguine.
Along with 48 other residents, second-home owners and visiting tourists, Glenn and Thomas were part of our research project on healthy ageing with nature. In this article, we highlight the findings of our study of older adults and nature.
Re-Framing Ageing
The WHO (2018) forecasts that the number of older adults (60+) will increase from 900 million to 2 billion people by 2050.
Enabling this older population of adults to live active, healthy and independent lives is a major challenge that will only increase over time. This situation is exacerbated by a range of structural inequalities and inequities that older adults face, including:
- Physical inactivity is the 4th leading risk factor in global mortality (WHO, 2020), which is made worse for older women, who on average, live six to eight years longer than males (WHO, 2021) but have less access to physically active lifestyles.
- More than 20% of older adults suffer from mental or neurological disorders, such as dementia, depression and anxiety (WHO, 2017) that can limit their participation in more healthy lifestyles.
- Increased social isolation among older adults can significantly reduce their access to nature, including its many well-established health and wellbeing benefits (Bork-Hüffer et al., 2021; Buckley, 2020; Keniger et al., 2013).
We too often associate ageing with a gradual, inevitable and universal disengagement from the world (e.g., Cumming & Henry, 1961). Because of this, we assume that older adults will also disengage from nature.
Contrary to these traditional assumptions, our InnoAgeing project does not associate ageing with a gradual, inevitable disengagement. Instead, older adults are active agents who may, or may not, choose to engage with nature.
Thus, we approach older adults as empowered and actively engaged in and with the world, including others and nature to a level that they so choose. Based on that, we examine how older adults vary in their understanding and interpretation of their engagements with nature and others, or lack thereof.
Innovating Ageing with Nature
The research project “Innovating Active Healthy Ageing with World Class Nature” (InnoAgeing) aimed to promote active, healthy ageing with nature to keep both older adults (55+) and nature in good health.
Unlike traditional social science research interviews and focus groups that are disconnected from nature, our InnoAgeing project used mobile, participatory and collaborative methods, such as go-alongs with residents, tourists and second homeowners (Duedahl & Blichfeldt, 2020). These included half-day nature-based activities in Denmark’s Wadden Sea National Park.
Among our 48 research participants were 10 male residents, who were specifically selected based on issues they had with social exclusion, decreased mobility, or loneliness (Liburd, Blichfeldt & Duedahl, 2021).
Wadden Sea National Park in Denmark
The Wadden Sea is a portion of the North Sea that stretches 500 kms (310 miles) along the coastline from Den Helder in the Netherlands, along the German coast, to Blaavands Huk in southwestern Denmark.
At first glance (see the pictures below), the Wadden Sea can appear barren, flat and simple — but its tides are unique. They rise and fall an average of two-metres (6.5 feet) and transport one billion cubic metres (35 billion cubic feet) of water in and out of the Wadden Sea twice each day (Christensen, 2014).
In 2010, the Danish Wadden Sea was designated as a National Park by the Danish Ministry of the Environment. In 2014, about 80% of the Danish Wadden Sea National Park was inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site for having the largest unbroken and undisturbed intertidal system of sand and mud flats in the world (UNESCO, 2014; Common Wadden Sea Secretariat).
As is the case in other parts of the world, the Danish Wadden Sea National Park plays an important role in addressing global, social and environmental challenges (Walsh 2021). It does this by maintaining historical ties and providing opportunities for new relationships between people and the environments and places that they identify with through work and play.
Becoming Older with Nature, or Not
A main finding from our research is that nature is not just nature. Why, how, and to what extent older adults engage in and with nature varies significantly. To some, like Glenn, the Wadden Sea is a static and indistinct landscape, which he can choose to be in, or not.
Due to his health, Glenn struggles to put on his hiking shoes to go for a walk, although he knows that it can make him healthier. When he finally does go into nature, he does not have deep emotional experiences, nor does he engage much with the nature when he is in it.
For others, such as Thomas, the Wadden Sea’s natural landscape is deeply appreciated. He feels that he is never done exploring or caring for it. To Thomas, every walk in the area is an opportunity of being-as-becoming with nature. He cannot wait to see what nature will meet and greet him each time he experiences the Wadden Sea.
The distinction between simply “being in nature” and “being-as-becoming with nature” is key. There are many reasons for Thomas to engage with nature, over and over, several times a week, whereas Glenn’s motivation to go for a walk is the daunting but necessary task of having to be physically active.
This distinction may be decisive for active, healthy ageing in and with nature.
“Being-as-becoming with nature” suggests a shift from understanding nature as simply something existing other-to-man to something more subjective, in which older adults become older with nature. This is how nature can support active, healthy ageing.
If we simply see nature as ‘other’ to humans, it is difficult to understand why we should protect and care for nature beyond concerns for our personal safety and survival (Liburd et al., 2021).
Becoming older with nature, however, is a provocative idea because it brings to light the limits of our current ways of thinking about the relationships between ageing, our environment, and public health initiatives.
If we want active healthy ageing in our natural environments, it is not enough to simply improve accessibility that only enhances being in nature — for example, by constructing yet another route, path, app, or information sign.
Instead, the key is to understand and enhance individual opportunities to engage with nature, and thereby caring for its well-being as well as our own.
About the Authors
Eva Duedahl is a Ph.D Research Fellow at the programme of Innovation in Services in the Public and Private Sector at Inland Norway University of Applied Sciences. Eva’s research focuses on collaborative design of tourism in relation to sustainable development.
Bodil Stilling Blichfeldt is an Associate Professor at the Department of Design and Communication at the University of Southern Denmark. Her research covers various aspects of tourism but primarily focuses on tourist and consumer studies, tourism marketing, innovation and branding. She teaches at the master programs in tourism at SDU and her teaching portfolio covers a wide range of issues both within and beyond tourism subjects. BSB’s list of publications contains 150 items (including 50 peer-reviewed journal articles).
Janne Liburd is Professor and Director of the Centre for Tourism, Innovation and Culture at the University of Southern Denmark. By ministerial appointment, Janne is the Chair of the UNESCO World Heritage Wadden Sea National Park. She is a cultural anthropologist; her research interests are in the field of sustainable tourism development, innovation and tourism higher education. Her research has resulted in more than 100 publications.
This Article was Based On:
Duedahl, E., Blichfeldt, B. S., Liburd, J. (2020). How engaging with nature can facilitate active healthy ageing. Tourism Geographies. https://doi.org/10.1080/14616688.2020.1819398
Related Academic Papers
Blichfeldt, B. S., & Duedahl, E. (2021). Go-alongs og being-alongs: Innovative kombinationer af interviews og deltager observationer. In S. Voxted (Ed.), Valg der skaber Viden. Academica [forthcoming]
Duedahl, E., & Blichfeldt, B. S. (2020). To walk the talk of go-along methods: Navigating the unknown terrains of being-along. Scandinavian Journal of Hospitality and Tourism, 20(5), 438–458. https://doi.org/10.1080/15022250.2020.1766560
Liburd, J., Blichfeldt, B. S., & Duedahl, E. (2021). Transcending the nature/culture dichotomy: Cultivated and cultured world class nature. Journal of Maritime Studies. [forthcoming]
Liburd, J., Duedahl, E., & Heape, C. (2020). Co-designing tourism for sustainable development. Journal of Sustainable Tourism, [ahead-of-print]. https://doi.org/10.1080/09669582.2020.1839473
Walsh, C. (2021). Protected area management in a post-natural world: Negotiated governance at the Danish Wadden Sea. Journal of Maritime Studies. [forthcoming]
For additional references on this topic, see any of the papers cited above
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