Senior Center Participation: Findings From a Multidimensional Analysis

Abstract

Data on three dimensions of senior center participation (number of activities, duration, and frequency of attendance) are analyzed for a sample of 235 participants drawn from eight senior centers m western New York Measures traditionally used in comparisons of center participants versus nonparticipants (sociodemographic characteristics, health, moral, accessibility, and social contact) are not found to relate to the three participation dimensions consistently. These findings suggest that the common research practice of conceptualizing senior center participation simply as a yes or no condition is conceptually and empirically suspect.