Questions to Ask the Elderly
Questions for talking with an older relative, neighbor, friend, or care home resident about their early life, work, marriage, and what their days hold now. Some are for asking the elderly about aging itself, several suit a 90 year old woman in particular, and a few open and close the session when you have to ask an elderly person questions in an interview for school or a family history. The guide covers pacing and the topics that need care.
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The questions
Each question, and why to ask it
Where did you grow up, and what was the house like?
Why ask it
Physical detail is easier to recall than dates, and describing rooms tends to open onto everything else: siblings, neighbors, chores, who slept where.
Who else lived with you when you were small?
Why ask it
Often surfaces people who never appear in family stories: a lodger, a grandmother, a cousin who stayed a year. Those names are usually lost otherwise.
What did your parents do for work?
Why ask it
Concrete and low effort, and it sets the economic backdrop for everything they later say about schooling, money, or leaving home.
What did you do on an ordinary Saturday as a child?
Why ask it
Ordinary beats memorable here. Routine detail is what later generations find most interesting, and it is exactly what nobody thinks to write down.
What was your first job, and what did it pay?
Why ask it
The wage is usually remembered exactly, and quoting it makes the era vivid in a way general reminiscence does not.
What food do you still miss from back then?
Why ask it
Easy, warm, and specific, and it often leads to a recipe worth writing down while somebody still remembers the quantities.
What did you listen to, and do you still?
Why ask it
Music is a reliable route into memory, and the answer gives you something to bring or play on your next visit.
How did you meet your husband or wife?
Why ask it
Ask it plainly. If the person has died, the story is usually still welcome, and they will decide how much of it to tell.
What was your wedding day actually like?
Why ask it
Expect practical detail: the weather, who could not come, what was eaten, what went wrong. Those are the parts that disappear first.
How did you learn to do the things you're good at?
Why ask it
Skills often came from an apprenticeship, a relative, or plain necessity rather than school, and the route is usually a story in itself.
Was there a decision that changed the direction of your life?
Why ask it
Often something small: a move, a chance meeting, a job turned down. This gets a more specific answer than a question about regrets.
What was the hardest stretch you went through?
Why ask it
Ask once and let them set the depth. Some will name an illness, a war, or a loss; others will change the subject, and that is an answer as well.
What did you worry about at my age that turned out not to matter?
Why ask it
Invites perspective without asking for advice, which makes it easier to answer honestly rather than dutifully.
What do people get wrong about your generation?
Why ask it
Gives them a chance to push back, and the answer often corrects a story their own family has been repeating for years.
What are you proudest of that nobody would guess?
Why ask it
The qualifier is what makes it work. Achievements inside a household or a workplace are usually invisible from the outside.
What has surprised you about getting older?
Why ask it
Asked plainly, this is usually welcomed rather than avoided. Answers range from physical changes to being spoken to differently by strangers.
When did you first feel old, if you ever have?
Why ask it
The last four words matter, because plenty of people in their eighties do not think of themselves as old. Those who do can usually name the moment: a fall, a retirement, the first time a stranger offered them a seat.
What is it like to be ninety?
Why ask it
Swap in their real age and say it without lowering your voice. Asked as plain curiosity it tends to get a plain answer, sometimes a funny one, and it shows a woman of ninety or a man of eighty-five that you are not tiptoeing around the number.
What age did you most enjoy being, and why that one?
Why ask it
Do not assume the answer will be a young one. Whatever age they name, ask what they had then that they did not have before or since.
What is easier now than it was at forty?
Why ask it
Aging is nearly always discussed as loss, so this asks for the other column. Caring less what people think and having nobody left to impress come up often, and they are worth hearing from someone who has got there.
What do you wish someone had told you about growing old?
Why ask it
They choose whether to give a warning or a reassurance. The answer is meant for the person asking as much as for them, so write it down.
Who from your life would you most want to talk to again?
Why ask it
A gentle route toward loss without asking about death directly. Follow their lead on how far the answer goes.
Which photographs matter most to you, and who is in them?
Why ask it
Names attached to faces are the thing families most often lose. Write them on the back or on a note while you are both looking.
What do you want the family to keep, and what can go?
Why ask it
Practical, and often a relief to be asked rather than intrusive. It covers objects, papers, and stories, and it saves guesswork later.
Is there anything you've never told us that you'd want us to know?
Why ask it
Leave a long silence after this one. Some people have been waiting to be asked; others need several visits before they answer, and both are fine.
What did you do on a Saturday night when you were twenty?
Why ask it
Reliably produces a livelier answer than asking about their youth in general, because it names a specific evening. Dance halls, cinemas, kitchens and street corners all come out of this one.
Who was the first person you fell for?
Why ask it
Gentler than asking about marriage, and it does not assume they married or that a spouse is still living. Many people have never been asked this and are pleased to be, though let it go if the answer is short.
What's the first thing you bought with your own money?
Why ask it
Small, sensory and easy to answer on a low-energy day. The object tends to come with the shop, the price and the feeling of having earned it.
Was there someone in the family everyone told stories about?
Why ask it
Finds the family legend, the difficult uncle or the great-aunt who emigrated. These are the stories that carry the family's own version of itself, and they are usually the first to be lost.
If you could go back to one year for a single day, which would it be?
Why ask it
The single day keeps it from becoming a question about regret. The year they choose, and who is in it, usually says who mattered most, and sometimes it is nobody the family expects.
What's your day like now, from when you get up?
Why ask it
Starting in the present treats them as someone with a current life rather than a source of anecdotes. It also tells you plainly how much help they are getting and what has quietly become difficult.
Who have you seen or spoken to this week?
Why ask it
The most useful question if you are keeping an eye on someone's wellbeing. A week with no names in it is worth noticing, and it is easier to hear that here than in an answer to "are you lonely."
What are you watching or reading at the moment?
Why ask it
Low effort, and it gives you something to bring next time, a book, a boxed set, a newspaper. People who have stopped reading because of their eyes rather than their interest will often say so here.
What do people say to you now that you find irritating?
Why ask it
Gives them room to object to being spoken to loudly, slowly, or as though decisions should be made for them. The answer will usually improve how you and your family talk to them.
What do you miss being able to do?
Why ask it
Ask it plainly and then leave a long pause. Driving, gardening, cooking for people and going to church come up often, and some of what is named can be partly restored with a lift or an adaptation.
Is there a story you'd want written down so it isn't lost?
Why ask it
Hands them the choice of what gets kept rather than you deciding. Ask permission to record or take notes, and expect the story they pick to be a surprise.
What was your father or mother like when nobody else was watching?
Why ask it
It gets past the tidy public version of a parent to something they actually observed. Answers here often explain, without anyone saying so, how they went on to raise their own children.
What did your parents worry about for you, and were they right?
Why ask it
The second half is what keeps this from becoming a list of household rules. It asks them to judge rather than report, and the verdict tells you what they now think mattered.
What was your mother's day like when you were a child?
Why ask it
A good question for a 90 year old woman, who watched a household being run in a way no one younger in the family ever saw. Washday, the cooking and who helped are details she may be the last person able to supply.
What were girls expected to do when you were growing up, and did you do it?
Why ask it
Her choices about school, work and marriage were made inside limits her granddaughters never met. The second half lets her say where she went along with them and where she quietly did not.
Who were the women you leaned on, and who leaned on you?
Why ask it
Sisters, neighbors and friends carried each other through births, illness and widowhood, and that history rarely reaches the family account. Ask for names and write them down while there is still someone who can give them.
What did you wear when you wanted to look your best?
Why ask it
Clothes are a vivid way into a decade: who made the dress or the suit, what it cost, where it was worn. If a photograph of it exists, ask to see it together.
Who was your closest friend at twenty, and what became of them?
Why ask it
This moves the conversation out of family and often produces a name nobody younger has heard. Be ready for the answer to be that the friend died young, and let the pause sit rather than filling it.
What did you think your life was going to be when you were starting out?
Why ask it
You get the distance between the plan and the life, which is where the story actually is. Notice whether they describe that distance as a loss, as luck, or as something they chose.
Was there news that came on and stopped the house?
Why ask it
Asking where they were standing produces a memory rather than a history lesson. What people recall is usually the domestic detail around the event, the meal interrupted or the neighbour at the door, not the event itself.
What was going on in the world when you were my age?
Why ask it
A staple when a student interviews an elderly person for a class, because it ties one life to the period being studied. Steer toward what reached their own street or kitchen, which is the part a textbook cannot give you.
What could you do with your hands that nobody bothers to learn now?
Why ask it
Mending, preserving, shorthand, engine work, tailoring: practical skills are a source of quiet pride that most people are never asked about. Some will offer to show you, and that is worth taking up the same day.
What did you do for work, and what part of it did you like?
Why ask it
The second half stops the answer at a job title. People who worked in ordinary jobs often describe skill and pride that never appeared on any record of their life.
What is the best trip you ever took?
Why ask it
Travel stories are safe, well rehearsed, and easy to tell on a low-energy day. Ask who they went with, because the answer often opens onto a friendship or a marriage you did not know about.
Is there something in this house with a story that nobody else knows?
Why ask it
Objects are a safe route into the past, and the story attached to a clock or a photograph is exactly what gets lost when a house is cleared. Note who they say should end up with it.
What did you believe about people at twenty-five that you no longer believe?
Why ask it
It asks for a revision rather than a summary, so it is hard to answer with a platitude. If the answer stays general, narrow it: ask about one person who changed their mind.
What have you had to make peace with?
Why ask it
Late in a conversation this often gets an honest answer where a direct question about regret gets deflection. If they change the subject, leave it there and try again on another visit instead of pressing.
What is the best advice you were ever given, and did you take it?
Why ask it
The second half saves this from becoming a proverb. Admitting they ignored it is usually the beginning of the more interesting story.
What has got better in your lifetime?
Why ask it
Asking for improvement first breaks the assumption that older people only want to say things have declined. Answers often mention dentistry, heating, washing machines, or how children are treated, which are not the answers people expect.
And what has got worse?
Why ask it
Following the previous question rather than leading with it produces something more considered than a general complaint. Listen for whether the loss is practical, such as buses and post offices, or social, such as neighbours knowing each other.
What do you wish people would ask you about instead of your health?
Why ask it
Many older people spend most of their conversations answering medical questions from relatives and staff. This hands the subject back to them, and the answer tells you what to bring up next time you visit.
What is the best thing about living here, and what is the worst?
Why ask it
Asking for both makes the second half answerable without it sounding like a complaint. In a care setting, keep in mind who can overhear, and follow up privately rather than pressing in a shared lounge.
What is the hardest part of the day for you?
Why ask it
This gets at the practical shape of their life without asking them to list their ailments. Answers such as the early evening, getting up, or Sunday afternoons tell whoever is organising support exactly when help is worth most.
Is there something you still want to do?
Why ask it
Ambition is rarely asked about after a certain age, and the answers are often small and achievable: seeing a particular person, going back to a street, eating something specific. Some of them you can arrange.
Is there anything you need that nobody has thought to offer?
Why ask it
Most people will not ask unprompted, and the requests that surface are usually small: a phone number written larger, a lightbulb, help with a form, a haircut. This is the question most likely to change something this week.
How would you like me to describe you when I write this up?
Why ask it
For an interview that will be handed in, printed or read aloud, this gives them a say in their own portrait. Check the spelling of names and places in the same breath, while you are still in the room.
Is there anything I should have asked you and didn't?
Why ask it
A dependable way to close an interview. Keep the recorder running while they think, since what comes next is often the thing they most wanted to say.
When would you like me to come back?
Why ask it
It hands them a decision, which is scarce in institutional settings, and it turns a one-off visit into something expected. If you name a day, keep it, because a missed visit costs more than the visit was worth.
How to Have These Conversations
Practical guidance for the conversation itself
Practical Setup
Keep visits short and repeat them
Forty minutes of good conversation is usually better than two hours. Tiredness makes recall harder, and a second visit gets more than a long first one.
Sort out the room first
Turn off the television, sit on the side of their better ear, and make sure your face is lit rather than backlit. Much of what looks like confusion is simply not hearing the question.
Bring prompts
Photographs, a map of the town they grew up in, or an old recipe will pull up detail that direct questions do not reach.
If you are interviewing an elderly person for school
Say at the start who the interview is for and roughly how long it will take. Begin by recording their full name and when and where they were born, choose ten or so questions instead of working down the whole list, and send them a copy of what you hand in.
Ask before recording
Say what the recording is for and who will hear it. Most people agree, and some talk more freely once they know it will be kept for grandchildren.
During the Conversation
- Ask one question and then wait. Recall takes longer than conversation normally allows, and filling the silence cuts off the answer.
- Do not correct dates or details. Being fact checked ends the storytelling, and the story is worth more than the accuracy.
- If a story repeats, let it. Repetition usually marks the parts that matter most to them.
- Follow the tangent. The unplanned turn is often where the material you did not know to ask for appears.
Topics That Need Care
Loss and death
Many older people are more willing to talk about these than their families expect. Ask once, plainly, and accept a change of subject without pressing.
Memory difficulty
If someone is living with dementia, questions about long ago are usually easier than questions about this week. Avoid quizzing them on names and dates, and follow whatever they offer.
Money, wills, and care plans
These matter, but they are a separate conversation from life stories. Raise them on their own, at a calm time, and involve whoever else needs to be there.
Health questions
Listening is useful, but nothing said in a conversation replaces a doctor. If something they describe concerns you, follow it up properly rather than reassuring them on the spot.