title: Baby boomers as future care users--An analysis of expectations in print media.
abstract: The aim of the study was to investigate media presentations of baby boomers as future care users. The Swedish baby boomer generation, born in the 1940s, and known as the '40s generation, has been characterized as youthful and powerful, and a question investigated in the study was whether boomers are supposed to display these characteristics as care users. We analyzed 481 articles in Swedish newspapers, published between 1995 and 2012, with a qualitative content analysis. The results showed that the '40s generation was predicted to become a new breed of demanding, self-aware care users. These claims were supported by descriptions of the formative events and typical characteristics of these individuals, which were then projected onto their future behavior as care users. Such projections tended to portray contemporary care users as passive, submissive, and partly responsible for problems associated with elder care. Consequently, approaches that focus on differences between cohorts need to incorporate a constructionist dimension to highlight the problem of generationism.
authors.affiliation: School of Social Work, Lund University, Sweden. Electronic address: Hakan.jonson@soch.lu.se.
authors.forename: Håkan
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Jönson
authors.affiliation: School of Social Work, Lund University, Sweden. Electronic address: Anders.jonsson@soch.lu.se.
authors.forename: Anders
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Jönsson
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D005544:Forecasting; D006301:Health Services Needs and Demand; D006299:Health Services for the Aged / Q000706:statistics & numerical data / Q000639:trends; D006801:Humans; D017008:Negotiating / Q000523:psychology; D009524:Newspapers as Topic; D010342:Patient Acceptance of Health Care; D010358:Patient Participation / Q000523:psychology; D011158:Population Growth; D012649:Self Concept; D012933:Social Identification; D013548:Sweden
keywords: Age stratification theory; Baby boomers; Eldercare; Generation; Media images