Let?s play pickleball: An intergenerational approach to promoting social connections and community engagement

Loneliness and social isolation are an epidemic connected to poor health and well-being outcomes. Older adults remain the highest at-risk group, yet trends indicate continued increases in loneliness among young adults (Office of the U.S. Surgeon General, 2023). Through community engagement efforts, universities can play a key role in mitigating social isolation within their local community. Despite university efforts to create community among students through civic engagement initiatives and athletic events, older adults, especially the socially isolated, are often overlooked and excluded in programming. This is concerning given the emotional and physical benefits younger and older adults experience through intergenerational activities (Wagner & Luger, 2021; Zhong et al., 2020). Furthermore, intergenerational connections positively impact levels of engagement (Wagner & Luger, 2021) and meaningful interactions across different age groups (Aguilera-Hermida et al., 2020; Zhong et al., 2020), while also promoting improved mental health in social gatherings such as pickleball events (Ryu & Heo, 2022). Given pickleball?s popularity among all age groups and its potential to be an important social institution fostering belonging, ECU?s Sport & Community Development Research Lab and Office of Healthy Aging propose creating and evaluating an intergenerational pickleball club for college students and older adults across Pitt County.

Scholars @ ECU