Intergenerational service-learning in higher education positively affects older adults and students, but little is known about the effectiveness of interdisciplinary, reverse mentoring programs that use technology as the medium of bringing generations together. This study describes an intergenerational service-learning program that utilizes reverse mentoring within higher education, the "Engaging Generations Program," at a midsized public university in New England where students help older adults learn about technology, and students gain communication and teaching skills. In this article, we outline how the program was implemented, present quantitative data on participation outcomes for students and older adults and qualitative data from older adults, and discuss best practices. Analysis of pre/post surveys found that students' attitudes toward aging improved (p < 0.01) and older adults interest in technology improved (p < 0.05) after program participation. Best practices identified included: multiple meetings with the same pair to deepen friendships, in-person training for student leaders, student responsibility for scheduling, tailoring sessions to each participant, student documentation of meetings, and active involvement by community partners.

A digital pursuit rotor task was used to measure dual task costs of language production by young and older adults. After training on the pursuit rotor, participants were asked to track the moving target while providing a language sample. When simultaneously engaged, young adults experienced greater dual task costs to tracking, fluency, and grammatical complexity than older adults. Older adults were able to preserve their tracking performance by speaking more slowly. Individual differences in working memory, processing speed, and Stroop interference affected vulnerability to dual task costs. These results demonstrate the utility of using a digital pursuit rotor to study the effects of aging and dual task demands on language production and confirm prior findings that young and older adults use different strategies to accommodate to dual task demands. Keywords Language production; dual task demandsThe use of concurrent tasks to study the allocation of attention and/or working memory has a rich history in psychology and neuropsychology (Baddeley, 1986;Baddeley, Lewis, Eldridge, & Thompson, 1984;Craik, Govoni, Naveh-Benjamin, & Anderson, 1996;Rosen & Engle, 1997). The study of dual task costs has become a central concern in cognitive aging research for both practical and theoretical reasons. Dual task costs may disrupt and impair the performance of older adults are watching television while responding to conversational inquiries (Tun, O'Kane, & Wingfield, 2002), driving a car while talking on the telephone (Strayer & Johnson, 2001), or ambulating round their environment in the company of others (Li, Lindenberger, Freund, & Baltes, 2001). Dual task costs have been linked theoretically to impairments of executive function (Baddeley, 1996), arising from deficits in time-sharing between the two tasks, costs of switching between tasks, failures to update task-specific cognitive representation, or a breakdown in the inhibition of automatic responses (Salthouse, Atkinson, Berish, 2003).Previous studies have examined the "penetration" of cognitive and attentional tasks by the simultaneous performance of motor tasks such as walking or other tasks such as word memorization (Lajoie, Teasdale, Bard & Fleury, 1996;Lindenberger, Marsiske, & Baltes;Li, et al., 2001;Maylor & Wing, 1996; Maylor, Allison, & Wing, 2001;Melzer, Menjuya, & Kaplanski, 2001; Teasdale, Bard, LeRue, & Fleury, 1993; Verghese, Buschke, Viola, et al., 2002). These studies of dual task costs confirm a link between cognition and sensory-motor Correspondence should be addressed to Susan Kemper, Gerontology Center, 3090 DHDC, 1000 Sunnyside Ave., University of Kansas, Lawrence, KS 66045 or E-mail: SKEMPER@KU.EDU. Preliminary reports of this research were presented at the annual meeting of the Gerontological Society of America, in November, 2006 and submitted by the 2 nd author in partial fulfillment of the requirements for a M. A. in Psychology from the University of Kansas. (Lindenberger et al., 2000; Welford, 1958) and suggest that motor tasks such a...

Reverse mentoring is a means to address the social work Grand Challenge of social isolation. Among older adults, reverse mentoring can improve social connection by increasing the digital competence of older adults so they can use technology for social benefit, and by facilitating intergenerational connections with young adult mentors. In this paper, reverse mentoring is examined within an intergenerational program that serves older adults and utilizes the native technological knowledge and skills of young adults who mentor older adult participants. Qualitative data were collected through young adult mentor logs of each session, and through open-ended questions on the post-surveys collected from older adults and young adult mentors. Qualitative analysis revealed three themes related to social connection: (1) an increased sense of self-efficacy for older adults as they build confidence in technological use, and for young adults as they develop leadership skills through mentoring, (2) the breaking down of age-related stereotypes, and (3) intergenerational engagement and connection. The findings demonstrate that reverse mentoring can be used in various settings to decrease the social isolation of older adults by developing intergenerational connections and increasing older adult usage of technology.

The Reclaiming Joy peer support intervention has potential for reducing depression and increasing quality of life in low-income older adults who have physical health conditions. It is feasible to administer and sustain the intervention through collaborative efforts with minimal program resources and a small amount of technical assistance.

The current study examined teaching modalities used by college students participating in an intergenerational, service-learning program that helps older adults learn technology and described reasons for older adults' continued participation in this program. Qualitative data analysis was completed using student-maintained observation logs from approximately 200 older participants. Several different teaching modalities used by student mentors were identified, including observing and listening, writing down information or creating visual aids, explaining the significance and simplifying materials, using repetition/review, and using hands-on learning. Multiple reasons for older adults' continued participation were identified, including continued progress on one topic or device; multiple topics for advanced use; learning multiple modalities to get connected; and continued learning through take-a-ways, practice, and homework. Service-learning programs can help educate health and human service professionals on best practices for working with older adults. [ Journal of Gerontological Nursing, 46 (1), 14–20.]