Critical Conditions: Research When Older Adults Face War, Migration, Natural Disasters, and Incarceration

The number of older prisoners will continue to increase worldwide. Currently, the proportion of older migrants and refugees is greater than it was previously. Moreover, the number of natural disasters will increase further because of climate change, which will impact older adultsOlder adults’ lives. Unfortunately, there is limited informationInformation about older adultsOlder adults in these situations due to scarce interest in these peculiar older adultsOlder adults and the difficulties that arise when performing researchResearch in inadequate circumstances. Furthermore, most of these situations involve disadvantaged older adultsOlder adults in low- and middle-income countries, so they are likely to be highly vulnerable to unintended adverse consequences of unethical researchResearch. Adequacies are needed in researchResearch protocols and safetySafety protocols. This chapter describes these older adultsOlder adults, and the issues researchers can encounter when studying them.