Aging on the Old Frontier and the New

Abstract

Roger Barker identified three life-shaping characteristics of the American Frontier and its settings—being unfinished (lacking many physical-social structures), being undermanned, and being imbued with uncertainty, with conditions that were poorly understood or unknown to the residents. Today, dramatic changes in the social and economic landscape of the rural Midwest that threaten the survival of many small communities and their behavior settings have created circumstances not unlike those of the 1800s, except that many of the pioneers are elderly. This research uses an experiential field approach to explore the applicability and impacts of Barker’s frontier conditions to the behavior settings that comprise three small Kansas communities today and the historical context from which they have evolved. The implications for the future of these communities and their residents, as well as the potential for intervention within existing behavior settings, are discussed.