| Abstract: | Abstract This qualitative research focused on the residual impressions of an intergenerational storytelling group retreat 4 years after the initial experience. During the retreat 5 women, ages 62 to 80, met with 7 adolescent girls, ages 13 to 15, during a weekend of storytelling that focused on female development. This was a single-gendered experience of non-related participants. The women shared personal experiences from their youth around the topics that included dating and peer influence, fashions, and puberty. The adolescents also discussed, described, and reflected their own experiences with the women. At the time of the follow-up interviews the adolescents ranged in age from 17 to 19 and the women 66 to 84. The retreat experience positively influenced both the adolescents and the older women four years later by building self-confidence, increasing the tendency to engage in new endeavors, and to be more open to others different from themselves. |
