Older rural women living with drought

ABSTRACT

Women’s experiences of drought are often made invisible particularly in terms of their long-term effects. Drought differs from other “natural disasters” in that droughts are, by definition, experienced over an extended time. This means those experiencing drought do so as they age, with elderly cohorts particularly vulnerable. As such, there is a need to better understand the longitudinal needs and experiences of women living with drought. This study investigates the experiences of drought for 15 Australian women aged over 70, over a period of 12 years. Longitudinal qualitative free-text comments written by the oldest cohort of women in the Australian Longitudinal Study on Women’s Health were subject to a thematic analysis. Findings indicate that experiences of drought have a relationship to women’s ability to age in ways they may have hoped. Themes of Work and Physical activity, Connection to place, and, Service access were prominent in women’s comments. These results demonstrate that place is an important aspect in the experience of ageing, that work and physical activity often intensify during drought for elderly people who might otherwise be expecting to retire, and that drought presents particular challenges for older women in terms of access to services. This study highlights the complex interactions of living and ageing in drought for Australian women.

KEYWORDS:

• Ageing
• environmental adversity
• gender
• free-text
• place
• drought
• rural women

Acknowledgements

This study was a component of Jane Rich’s PhD thesis.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

ORCID

Sarah L. Wright http://orcid.org/0000-0002-8595-4529

Deborah Loxton http://orcid.org/0000-0002-4745-8612

Notes

1 All relevant ethical clearances have been sought for this project from the University of Newcastle (H07-60795) and University of Queensland (200400024). All participant information has been de-identified and confidentiality protected.

Additional information

Funding

The Australian Longitudinal Study on Women’s Health, which was conceived and developed by groups of interdisciplinary researchers at the Universities of Newcastle and Queensland, is funded by the Australian Government Department of Health. We are grateful to the women who participate in this study. This study was a component of Jane Rich’s PhD thesis; Rich was a recipient of an Australian Postgraduate Award (Department of Education and Training, Australian Government). Sarah Wright’s research is funded through a Future Fellowship from the Australian Research Council.