title: Understanding fall meaning and context in marketing balance classes to older adults.
abstract: This study explored older, community-dwelling adults' attitudes and values about proposed church-delivered balance classes for fall prevention. Community observation, group interviews with stakeholders, key informant interviews, and focus groups with church members ≥ 60 years of age were analyzed in two ways: first for inductive themes expressing community sentiment about fall prevention for older adults, then for content useful in creating locally tailored social marketing messages. Four themes expressed perceptions of fall-prevention programming: de-emphasizing fall risk and emphasizing strength and independence, moving older adults out of their "comfort zones" to join classes, identifying relationships to support fall-prevention activities, and considering gender-based differences in approaches to fall prevention. A content analysis of the same dataset yielded information about preferred places in the community, promotion through churches, a tolerable price, and the balance class product itself. The qualitative results will inform the social marketing program to increase intervention delivery success.
authors.affiliation: The University of Utah, Salt Lake City, UT, USA.
authors.forename: Lauren
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Clark
authors.forename: Sallie
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Thoreson
authors.forename: Cynthia W
authors.initials: CW
authors.lastname: Goss
authors.forename: Lorena Marquez
authors.initials: LM
authors.lastname: Zimmer
authors.forename: Mark
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Marosits
authors.forename: Carolyn
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: DiGuiseppi
mesh_terms: D000058:Accidental Falls / Q000517:prevention & control* / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D000375:Aging / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D010465:Perception; D004856:Postural Balance / Q000502:physiology*; D012307:Risk Factors
keywords: attitudes and perception toward aging/aged; falls; qualitative methods