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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Public Health
Sec. Aging and Public Health
Volume 13 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fpubh.2025.1531173
This article is part of the Research Topic Health Literacy and Digital Health Literacy among Older Adults: Public Health Interventions View all 16 articles
Multilevel Factors Influencing eHealth Adoption among Older Adults during the Pandemic
Provisionally accepted
BoRin Kim *
Chung Hyeon Jeong 
Emily Blood Sajay Arthanat Marguerite Corvini Casey Golomski John Wilcox - University of New Hampshire, Durham, United States
While eHealth became prevalent in healthcare during the pandemic, eHealth adoption by older adults has been slow. This digital divide could lead to worsening health and healthcare disparities. Guided by the push-pull-mooring perspective, this study explored factors influencing eHealth adoption among older adults. Semi-structured virtual interviews were conducted in 2021 with 31 older adults with healthcare needs. Interviews were thematically coded and analyzed using constant comparative methods. We found the pandemic to be a powerful push factor that forced older adults to adopt eHealth along with several pull factors that attracted older adults to use eHealth. A number of mooring factors that made older adults hesitant to adopt eHealth were identified: limited knowledge or skills on eHealth, security concerns, limited technology access, and peer influence. Our findings indicate areas to increase productive use of eHealth within older populations, such as education or support within social networks.
Keywords: ehealth adoption, qualitative research, multilevel, Push factors, pull factors, mooring factors
Received: 19 Nov 2024; Accepted: 20 Mar 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Kim, Jeong, Blood, Arthanat, Corvini, Golomski and Wilcox. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence:
BoRin Kim, University of New Hampshire, Durham, United States
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