The Role and Importance of Radio and Television and the Internet in the Lives of Older People

The paper tackles the problem of the role and importance of media in the lives of elderly people. It takes into account the concept of media, both traditional ones like radio and television from the sociological point of view, and modern ones like the Internet as a universal tool. Media have been noticed in the lives of seniors as a past memory and a link to modern times. The research conducted on a small group showed resources of technical media in seniors’ households and presented the seniors’ attitudes to the information and pictures of reality provided by the media. New media are on the border of habits and everyday routines of these people and completely new technologies which are brought about by modern times. In the context of so many economic, civilizational, political and social transformations as well as a dynamic development of media, their deep embedment in the lives of elderly people is shown. There is no doubt that irrespective of age, there is a strong need for lifelong learning in the process of forming awareness of the contents provided by communicators and widely understood media. A very important thing is to show possibilities of the used media to promote education at different levels and in different forms. It should be noted that this type of research is still a challenge for today’s researchers and a task which, despite numerous difficulties, is worthwhile. The problems raised in this paper are a starting point for further research which is particularly interesting and important in the context of changes within broadly understood culture, media technology and media convergence. The demographic trend entails certain economic consequences, and with them social ones, because it requires the adoption of radical actions in public policy, especially in the field of health or education.