Results of a new survey provide one window into the minds of potential senior living residents and, in some cases, their adult children.

When OnePoll, on behalf of insurance broker ClearMatch Medicare, surveyed 2,000 adults aged more than 65 years, 45% of them said they’d prefer to obtain information about retirement programs themselves, from professionals, and 38% said they felt the same way about obtaining information about healthcare programs. It’s not a stretch to believe that these older adults would feel similarly when looking for senior living communities.

Also in the poll, 35% of respondents said they felt more confident in their ability to research healthcare information online than they did relying on family members (27%) or friends (23%). And 57% said they use social media to communicate with family and friends. These findings bolster previous research conveying the importance of websites and social media when communicating with prospects and their adult children.

Regarding respondents’ views on aging:

  • 72% said they feel younger than they are, and half said they feel younger than 50.
  • 84% said they have embraced aging.
  • The best parts of getting older, they said, are having more time to do what they want (64%), retiring (60%), having more time to relax (56%), spending time with family (49%), and “being able to say what I want” (36%).

These points can be inspiring when crafting marketing messages and daily programming and also might be useful to recall during our everyday interactions with older adults.