Developing and Testing Training Resources to Improve Social Connectedness With Homebound Older Adults Who Receive Home-Delivered Meals

Social isolation is disproportionately experienced by homebound older adults, including those who receive home-delivered meals. We used a three-phase, human-centered design approach to create and evaluate training resources focused on social isolation for meal-delivery drivers. We hypothesized that these training resources would increase meal-delivery drivers' behavioral intentions to have meaningful interactions with their clients. Working with subject matter experts and meal-delivery drivers, our team developed and produced a training video and website and evaluated the resources with a sample of meal-delivery drivers in Rhode Island, Texas, and Mississippi via an online survey. Respondents (<i>n</i> = 94) were 64% female, 65% age 55+, and 79% white. Respondents reported improved (<i>p</i> < .001) agreement with the main outcome, "I intend to regularly have meaningful social conversations with the clients I see." Through these scalable training resources, drivers may increase their intention to have meaningful conversations with older adults at risk for social isolation.