ONGOING RESEARCH
Empowering Senior Voices Program
Connecting lived experience with better places, services and decisions
A participatory research approach that enables older adults to turn lived experience into evidence and work with communities and decision-makers to inform decisions, shape practical action and support continued participation.
Research lead:
Prof Bernardo Figueiredo
Research Lead:
Key insights
Older adults bring valuable expertise about their own lives, communities and local environments.
Participatory research can turn lived experience into evidence that informs priorities, decisions and practical action.
The approach connects older adults, researchers, communities and decision-makers from preparation and evidence generation through to action, response and continued participation.
Impact in practice
City North provides the first applied example of the Empowering Senior Voices Program in action.
Twenty-three older adults generated 675 observations about their local environment, which were collaboratively analysed into eight priority themes and brought together with researchers, community organisations and government stakeholders.
The project demonstrated a pathway from lived experience to evidence, shared priorities and practical action. This included the April Falls Day initiative, where a citizen-scientist's idea progressed through collaboration with the City of Melbourne and cohealth into a public falls-prevention campaign and workshops.
Learning from City North is also informing the emerging VOICES Framework for Sustainable Civic Participation, extending understanding of what supports lived knowledge to influence decisions and participation over time.
About the research
The Empowering Senior Voices Program connects lived experience with better places, services and decisions.
The approach combines participatory research, community-led insight and collaborative design to help communities understand what matters to older adults and connect lived experience with evidence, decision-making and practical action.
Rather than following a fixed process with a defined endpoint, Empowering Senior Voices can adapt to different communities, projects and local contexts. It supports ongoing learning, reflection and collaboration, allowing priorities, responses and opportunities for continued participation to develop as the research progresses.
Why it matters
Older adults are often consulted about the places, services and communities around them, but consultation does not always give them a meaningful role in generating evidence or shaping what happens next.
Empowering Senior Voices starts from a different position: older adults bring expertise about their own lives and experiences. By bringing that lived experience together with research and collaborative decision-making, the approach creates a pathway from what people experience to evidence, priorities and practical action.
Research focus
Lived experience as evidence
How older adults' everyday experiences, observations and knowledge can contribute evidence about the places and communities in which they live.
Participation and collaborative decision-making
How older adults, researchers, communities and decision-makers can interpret evidence together, identify priorities and co-design responses.
From research to sustained action
How participatory research can move beyond consultation and findings to support practical change, institutional response, ongoing collaboration and continued participation.
How the research is being conducted
The Empowering Senior Voices Program uses a six-stage participatory research approach:
1. Prepare: Build the foundations through ethical approval, community-based recruitment, relationship building and participant onboarding.
2. Discover: Older adults explore their communities and capture lived experiences, observations and insights.
3. Discuss: Participants, researchers and partners interpret the evidence together to identify shared themes, priorities and opportunities.
4. Activate: Insights and priorities are brought together with stakeholders to co-design responses and identify opportunities for action.
5. Change: Evidence and ideas are translated into practical actions, resources and opportunities to influence positive chang
6. Future Focus: Learning, relationships and participation are carried forward to support continued involvement, future collaboration and new opportunities for action.
Prepare and Future Focus extend the participatory process at both ends. Prepare strengthens the foundations for meaningful participation before research begins, while Future Focus carries learning, relationships and opportunities forward beyond findings and recommendations.
Who the research is for
Local and state government
Community organisations and facilitators
Researchers
Service providers
Organisations working with older adults
Policymakers and planners
Older adults and community participants
Potential impact
The Empowering Senior Voices Program provides a structured pathway for strengthening how older adults participate in research, community planning and decision-making, recognising lived experience as a source of evidence rather than treating participation as consultation alone.
Its application in City North demonstrated how older adults can generate locally grounded evidence, work with researchers and stakeholders to identify shared priorities, and contribute to practical responses.
As the approach is adapted and tested across different settings, it provides a foundation for further research into how lived knowledge can influence decision-making, strengthen relationships between communities and institutions, and support participation beyond individual projects.