This study aimed to better understand the extent to which older adult centres are a focal point for recreation and social activities for their members. Travel diaries completed by 261 members of 12 older adult centres across Ontario provided comprehensive and real-time (24-hour) data over two consecutive weeks concerning time away from home, trip purposes, and modes of travel. The data showed that nearly one-third of their trips included a stop at their older adult centre. Three-quarters also went to other community venues over the study period, possibly to access amenities (e.g., pools) not available at their centre. Notwithstanding, their local older adult centre was still a focal point in out-of-home travel, particularly for potentially more vulnerable older adults, including those who were non-drivers, had less education, and felt lonelier. The diaries also substantiated the importance of time spent socializing with peers and staff at the centre, apart from formal program participation.

Senior centres have been identified as a “focal point” for delivering services to the rapidly growing older adult populations in Canada and the United States. Despite this important role, academic research studying senior centres has been limited. This scoping review identified English-language empirical research studies focusing on senior centres that were published in an academic journal in 2000 or later. A total of 58 studies were identified (n = 51 American and n = 7 Canadian). The majority of the articles focused on themes related to the participation of individuals at senior centres; a smaller number focused on themes related to the senior centre environment. Based on the findings, it is suggested that future research focus on benefits of senior centre programming, with specific focus on needs of baby boomers; key factors related to funding, space, and staffing; and the characteristics and role of senior centres in the Canadian context.

Centres for seniors offering leisure-time activities currently represent significant actors that translate the idea of active ageing into a particular approach to seniors. Despite the fact that active ageing is now represented by the state and providers of social services as the universally desirable way of ageing, the significantly smaller numbers of male clients was identified as a marked feature of such organisations. A three-year ethnographic study was conducted at two centres in the Czech Republic which offer seniors-only leisure-time activities strongly grounded in the idea of active ageing. The method of participant observation was used, and 47 in-depth interviews were conducted with the centres' clients and employees. The higher participation by women in the centres and the role they attribute to such organisations in their lives is analysed in the context of their previous gendered biographies. Gender patterns embedded in the way daily activities at the senior centres are organised, as well as in the idea of active ageing itself, are highlighted. Despite the seeming invisibility of gender as a principle that structures the way these centres are run, they are in fact gendered organisations, where gender emerges as a basic principle affecting the chances of participating in active ageing as presented by the centres.

This paper examines gender differences in helping networks for three different illness situations (common ailments, hypothetical short-term health emergencies, and functional disability) among participants attending day hospitals and senior centres in Winnipeg, Manitoba. The findings show that women are more likely than men to receive assistance from family members other than a spouse and to receive assistance from friends as well. Gender emerged as a significant correlate of who helped, even when controlling for availability of that person, extent of the illness, other health factors, and social network characteristics.