Samenvatting

Hungary has one of the lowest numbers of people in the European Union who live a healthy life. Therefore, new strategies need to be developed to motivate them to live a physically active life. In order to come up with an effective strategy for this, the perceptions of elderly about the physical aspects of healthy ageing and (physical) frailty first need to be understood. The aim of this research is to gain insight into the perception of the Hungarian elderly of (physical) frailty and the physical aspects of healthy ageing.

For this research, a cross-sectional qualitative design was chosen, where in-depth interviews were conducted with the Hungarian elderly. The six included participants were all between the ages of 63 and 82, three males and three females.

Hungarian elderly defined healthy ageing as remaining capable of living independently and frailty as losing this independence. To ensure healthy ageing and prevent frailty, they believed one should live a healthy life, though the participants were not in agreement about the specifics of what this entails. They put an emphasis on maintaining physical and mental health states as much as possible, though their opinion differed on how successfully this can be achieved. Due to these disagreements and not reaching saturation on the theme of frailty, further research is indicated.