The extent and quality of social support for learning provided by warm experts has received limited scholarly attention. Using a sequential exploratory mixed-methods approach, and a point of departure in theory regarding opportunities for and barriers to learning, the study starts with qualitative interviews with 22 individuals aged 70-94. Relationships between older adults and their children and grandchildren are analyzed, and experiences of opportunities and barriers for learning are identified. These findings are operationalized into items in a survey distributed to a representative sample of Sweden’s population aged 65-90 (n=1,610), to measure variations in the quantity and quality of social support for learning. Findings reveals that children are mainly engaged as warm experts, and the more frequently families meet, the more frequently support for learning takes place, and the higher the perceived quality. Age, income and education, show no relationship with the perceived quality of social support for learning.

 The slogan “digital first” has become a buzzword for public organisational development at the local, regional, and national levels in Sweden. The slogan alludes to the idea that providing information to and communication with citizens should take place primarily through digital channels. This idea is also popular in other parts of the digitalised world. Obviously, digital solutions have the potential to become pedagogical, reliable, and effective interfaces for governmental interaction with citizens. However, the extent to which they are actually accessible, brought to use, and valued among older adult users (more than 65 years of age) has not attracted much research interest. Drawing on national survey data, collected in November–December 2020, on Swedish citizens (aged 65 to 90 years), this article will start to compensate for this deficit. First, it analyses the extent to which citizens have physical access to required devices and how access is related to material, discursive, and social resources. Second, it analyses resources and usage of important platforms for public services for older adults: the Pensions Agency, health care, e-pharmacy, the Social Insurance Agency, and the Tax Agency. Finally, the article examines outcomes: feelings and attitudes towards experiences of encountering a digitalising society. The article demonstrates how all three levels of divides—access, usage, and outcomes—are clearly related to older adults’ access to material, discursive, and social resources, as well as to age and pre-retirement experience with computers. It is comparatively younger individuals with longer formal education and at least average incomes and social networks who benefit the most from digitalised public services.

From the very outset, the domestication approach was inspired by an ambition to inform policy debates. This was obvious in early delineations of the approach in the 1980s. However, later research inspired by the notion of domestication has often come to overlook this ambition. This chapter presents three examples of analyses that engage with the notion of domestication in everyday contexts, while also explicitly addressing policy. The first case is based on data collected two decades ago when home computers with Internet connections had started to become commonplace in Swedish households. The second case focuses on how Swedish teachers deal with children’s mobile phones in leisure-time centres. The third case draws on interviews with older adults covering their reflections on and use of ICTs. This chapter argues for and illustrates the policy relevance of domestication research, and points towards the future. As media technology develops, it becomes of continuous importance to offer insights from domestication research. Studies can contrast, challenge, and hopefully feed into the formation of insights into what is going on in and around media technology. To do so, policy relevance needs to be explicitly formulated and communicated to relevant stakeholders as an integral part of research practice.

The ongoing digitalisation of societies, exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic, has led to increased efforts to ensure the digital inclusion of older adults. Digital inclusion strategies throughout the COVID-19 pandemic predominantly focused on increasing access and basic digital literacy of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) for all members of society. Older adults, who are more likely to experience digital exclusion, are amongst the target groups of digital inclusion strategies. We propose that beyond digital inclusion, there is a need to focus on digital participation and optimise opportunities for everyone to participate in communities and society in post-pandemic times. Creative digital skills are the foundation of digital participation and can lead to a variety of contributions. Digital participation offers conditions that support agency and active contributions in a digitalised society. Taking macro-, meso-, and micro-level enablers of digital participation in later life into account, we argue for the establishment and implementation of multi-layered and multisectoral partnerships that address environmental factors (including social and physical dimensions) of digital participation and create opportunities for diverse, meaningful and fulfilling engagement with ICTs in later life. The partnership approach can be used in designing and implementing digital participation programmes and should be further evaluated against the needs and lived experiences of older individuals. Foresighted research is needed to investigate key factors of effective partnerships for optimising environments for digital participation in later life.

The concept warm experts originally referred to people who helped their friends and family to come to terms with home-based computers and Internet connections. As digital technologies have continuously come to permeate our everyday lives, the tasks for warm experts have grown in kinds and character. The present study contributes to our understanding of warm experts by exploring the learning process involving the warm expert and the less knowledgeable other(s). Drawing on interviews with older adults (70 to 94 years of age), the study specifically explores older users’ experiences of learning about digital media with children and grandchildren. The results reveal how interaction with warm experts constituted important learning opportunities for the older adults, in which they developed their skills in using digital media. However, establishing potential learning situations and learning from warm experts was not a straightforward matter, but surrounded by a multitude of barriers structuring the possibilities for learning. This shows how the role of the warm expert is fluid and materializes in different ways in different situations. The warm expert can take the position (or be positioned) as one who solves technical issues. The warm expert can be one who fails in teaching, or one who adopts the position as a warm teacher and contributes to learning among the less knowledgeable user. In order to also be a warm teacher, the warm expert needs to understand the specific learning needs and styles of the less knowledgeable other and adapt to these needs.