Sexuality After 50

Sexuality After 50

My name is Andy Chen, and I am a recent graduate from the Department of Sociology at Princeton University in the United States. Currently, I am spending a year as a research associate at the Royal College of Art's Helen Hamlyn Centre in London, which is dedicated to engineering design solutions that improve the lives of socially-excluded populations.

My assignment this year is to work with Help the Aged and Age Concern to create graphic design solutions that address social stigma surrounding ageing and sexuality. In both the US and the UK, older people constitute the fastest-growing HIV-positive population segment. Yet, because society does not acknowledge older people's sexuality, there is a lack of information available to people over 50 regarding sexually-transmitted infections (STI's).

Specifically, my task is to use ethnographic methods to examine the growing problem of STI's among people over 50, and then to use graphic design to (a) inform older people about STI's and the need to use protection, (b) improve physician screening for STI's among older people, and (c) reshape general social perceptions about ageing and intimacy.

I thought a good way to get some input on what people over 50 think about their own sexuality was to post on this message board. I'd be interested in any thoughts you might have to share about the ideas mentioned above.

Here are some specific questions I'm interested in:

1. Have you noticed any changes to your health with age?

2. Has your doctor ever raised the topic of sexual health with you? Do you ever talk to your doctor about sex? If not, who do you talk to about sexual health?

3. Are you sexually active? If not, when was the last time you had sex?

 4. Have you ever been instructed in using protection? What kind of protection have you used? Do you think protection is important?

5. What do you think younger people think about older people's intimate lives?

6. Have you ever experience discrimination on account of your age?

7. Do you find it difficult talking about sex to your peers? To your children? To your doctor?

8. Have you ever received literature or seen adverts related to STI prevention? Have you responded to these awareness campaigns?

Feel free to email me at the address below if that is more comfortable for you.

Much appreciative,

Andy

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Andy Chen

Fulbright Research Associate 

The Royal College of Art Helen Hamlyn Centre

andy.chen@rca.ac.uk