Transcript PSYC 2314 Lifespan Development

PSYC 2314
Lifespan Development
Chapter 17
Early Adulthood:
Biosocial Development
Growth, Strength and Health
• Full height is reached at about age 16 in
females and 18 for males.
• Muscle growth and fat accumulation
continue into the 20s.
• In both sexes, physical strength increases
during the 20s, reaching a peak at about age
30.
Grow, Strength and Health
• Digestive, respiratory, and sexualreproductive systems function at an
optimum level during early adulthood.
• Most visits to the doctor are necessitated not
by disease but by injuries or normal
pregnancy.
• Of the fatal diseases, cancer is the leading
cause of death in young adults.
Grow, Strength and Health
• Senescence: age-related physical decline
– Genes
– Environment
– Personal choices
Growth, Strength and Health
• Signs of aging
– Skin during the 20s
– Graying of the hair often begins around 30
• Body systems decline at different rate
– Kidneys-about 4% per decade
– Lungs-about 5% per decade
Grow, Strength and Health
• Homeostasis—the adjustment of the body’s
systems to keep the physiological functions
in a state of equilibrium.
– The older the person is, the longer it takes
• Most bodies are capable of functioning very
well until at least 70.
Growth, Strength and Health
• Sexual Responsiveness
– Male and female bodies follow a similar sequence of
sexual activation at every age: arousal, peak
excitement, orgasm, refraction and recovery.
– As men grow older, they often need more explicit or
prolonged stimulation to produce sexual arousal. In
addition, a longer time elapses between the beginning
of sexual excitement and full erection, between erection
and ejaculation, and between orgasm and the end of the
refractory period.
Growth, Strength and Health
• Women become more likely to experience orgasm
as they mature from early adolescence toward
middle adulthood.
– More prolonged stimulation provided as a consequence
of the slowing down of the man’s responses.
– With experience, both partners focus on those aspects
of love-making that intensify the woman’s responses.
– Increasing sexual awareness and openness.
– Aging makes reproduction less likely for women,
thereby their sexual passions can increase.
The Sexual-Reproductive System
• Infertility—the lack of a successful
pregnancy after one year of regular
intercourse without contraception.
– In males, low number of sperm and/or the
sperm’s poor motility
• Senescence
• Anything that impairs normal body functioning
(high fever, radiation, prescription drugs, drug
abuse, alcoholism, cigarette smoking, etc.)
The Sexual-Reproductive System
• Women can be infertile for many reasons:
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Being underweight and being obese
Failure to ovulate
Blocked Fallopian tubes
Endometriosis
Infections and fibrous tumors
Medical Treatment
• In vitro fertilization (IVF)
• Gamete intra-Fallopian transfer (GIFT) and
zygote intra-Fallopian transfer (ZIFT)
Health Problems
• Drug Abuse
• Destructive Dieting
• Violence
Drug Abuse
• Drug addiction is measured by the need for more
of a drug, indicative of withdrawal symptoms.
– Women use and abuse drugs less than men
– College undergraduates are particularly vulnerable to
drug abuse
– Late teens and early twenties are the time of heaviest
alcohol and marijuana use
– Around age 23 is the time of heaviest use of other
drugs, including cocaine.
Drug Abuse
• Genetic Temperament
– An attraction to excitement
– A low tolerance for frustration
– A vulnerability to depression
Drug Abuse
• Reasons for the high rate of drug use and
abuse in the first years of adulthood
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Being in transition between families
Several life stresses
Lack of religious faith and practice
Social surroundings
Dieting
• Excessive concern with weight can become
pathological
– Anorexia nervosa
– Bulimia nervosa
Theories of Development on Dieting
• Psychoanalytic: women develop eating
disorders because of a conflict with their
mothers.
• Learning: for some people with low selfesteem, fasting, bingeing, and purging have
powerful effects as immediate reinforcers.
Theories of Development on Dieting
• Cognitive: women compete with men in
business and industry, they want to project a
strong, self-controlled, masculine imagine
antithetical to buxom, fleshy body of the
ideal woman of the past.
• Sociocultural: the contemporary cultural
pressure to be “slim and trim” and modellike
Theories of Development on Dieting
• Epigenetic: girls who are overwhelmed
with the stresses of puberty may discover
that self-starvation makes their menstrual
periods cease, their sexual hormones
decrease, and their curves disappear—all of
which relieve the pressures to marry and
reproduce.
Violence
• Social values are at the root of the problem
– Manhood rituals
– Positive masculine tendencies turn into
negative male traits
Violent Death
• Presence of alcohol
• A weapon
• A lack of self-restraint