Perceptual Differences in Age-Friendly City Dimensions Between Older Adults and Urban Managers: Evidence from Kerman, Iran
This 2025 cross-sectional study of Kerman, Iran, reveals that both older adults and urban managers perceive the city's age-friendliness as generally poor, yet they hold significantly different views on specific dimensions such as transportation, outdoor spaces, housing, and information access, highlighting a critical need for more inclusive urban planning.
Original paper licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). This is an AI-generated explanation of the paper below. It is not written or endorsed by the authors. For technical accuracy, refer to the original paper. Read full disclaimer
Cities are built for movement, for the rush of daily life, and for the future. But as the world's population ages, a quiet question has emerged: do our cities still work for the people who have lived there the longest? The answer depends heavily on who you ask. For decades, researchers have used a framework developed by the World Health Organization to measure how well a city supports its older residents. This framework looks at eight specific areas, from the sidewalks and public buses to the way neighbors treat one another and how information is shared. The goal is to create places where older adults can stay independent, safe, and connected. However, a significant gap often exists between the people who design these cities and the people who live in them. Planners and officials often judge a city by the projects they have finished and the rules they have written, while residents judge it by the simple, daily reality of whether they can walk to the market or catch a bus without fear. Understanding this gap is crucial because a city that looks good on paper might still feel impossible to navigate for an aging body.
In the city of Kerman, located in the hot, arid southeast of Iran, a team of researchers set out to measure this exact disconnect. They wanted to see if the people managing the city and the older adults living in it saw the same reality. To do this, they gathered two distinct groups: three hundred community-dwelling older adults, aged sixty and above, and one hundred and eighty-six urban managers, including senior officials and experts from fifteen different organizations involved in city planning and social services. The researchers asked both groups to rate the city across the eight key areas of age-friendliness. They used a standard questionnaire that asked about everything from the condition of outdoor spaces to the availability of community support. The answers were then converted into scores on a scale from zero to one hundred, where a higher number meant the city was doing a better job of supporting older people.
The results painted a clear and somewhat sobering picture. In Kerman, neither group felt the city was truly age-friendly. In fact, the average scores for every single category fell below fifty, indicating a generally unfavorable situation for older residents. The city was not meeting the standards set for a supportive environment, regardless of who was looking at it. Yet, when the researchers compared the two groups, a distinct pattern of disagreement emerged. The urban managers tended to give higher marks to the physical infrastructure of the city. They rated the outdoor spaces, buildings, and transportation systems more favorably than the older adults did. For the managers, these systems likely appeared functional because they were looking at completed projects and administrative reports. For the older adults, however, the reality was different; they rated transportation as the most difficult area, with an average score of just over forty. To them, the buses, the sidewalks, and the streets did not feel safe or accessible enough for their daily needs.
In a twist that highlights how different perspectives shape our view of the world, the older adults gave higher scores than the managers in two other areas: housing and communication. The older residents felt quite satisfied with their homes, likely because most of them owned their houses and felt a deep sense of stability and security in their living spaces. The managers, on the other hand, evaluated housing against strict technical standards for accessibility and design, which made them view the same homes as less adequate. Similarly, the older adults felt they had enough access to information and communication. They relied on traditional channels like television and face-to-face conversations, which they found sufficient. The managers, looking toward the future of digital services and smart city technologies, felt these systems were lacking. It was a classic case of two groups looking at the same city through different lenses: one seeing what was built and the other seeing what was actually experienced.
There were also areas where both groups agreed, though the agreement was not on high praise. In categories like social participation, respect, and community health services, the scores were low for everyone, and the gap between the two groups was small. This suggests that both the planners and the residents recognize that the city is struggling to provide adequate social inclusion and support. Interestingly, the managers themselves gave the lowest score of all categories to "respect and social inclusion," admitting that the cultural and social attitude toward aging in the city needs work. This self-awareness from the decision-makers is a vital clue. It shows that even those in charge know that building better sidewalks is not enough; the city also needs to change how it treats its older citizens.
The study concludes that Kerman has a long way to go before it can be called an age-friendly city. The most critical takeaway is that the people who design the city and the people who live in it are not seeing the same problems. The managers see progress in infrastructure that the residents do not feel in their daily lives. To fix this, the researchers argue that city planning cannot happen in a vacuum. It must include the voices of the older adults themselves, not just as subjects of study, but as active partners in decision-making. Only by bridging this perceptual gap can Kerman, and cities like it, begin to build environments that truly support the aging population, ensuring that the city works for everyone, not just on paper.
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