Transcript CHAPTER 3 Affirmative Aging

CHAPTER 3
Affirmative Aging - Adulthood
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Chapter Summary
Adult Development
Decisions, Decisions, Decisions –
Early Adulthood
Leaving Home
Choosing A Career
Establishing Close Relationships
Starting A Family
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Chapter Summary Cont’d
Same Old, Same Old – Middle Adulthood
Midlife Transition Or Midlife Crisis?
Physical And Cognitive Changes
Possible Career Changes
Sexual Changes
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Chapter Summary Cont’d
Aging Gracefully – Late Adulthood
Physical And Cognitive Changes
Personal And Social Adjustment
Retirement
Successful Aging
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Adult Development
Definition:
Adulthood can be defined as the period of life
from physical maturity on, consisting of a sequence
of physical and physiological changes throughout
early, middle, and late adulthood.
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Adult Development Cont’d
Certain themes are important to adult
development:
One theme is the increased
importance of individual
differences as we age.
The other theme is that
adulthood, as is childhood, is a
period of continued
development
and
personal change.
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Decisions, Decisions,
Decisions – Early Adulthood
Leaving Home
An important task in early adulthood is
perceiving ourselves as separate from our
families.
External aspects of this transformation
include moving out of our childhood
home and being less dependent
financially on our parents.
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Leaving Home Cont’d
Internal aspects include differentiating
ourselves from our parents and becoming a
more autonomous decision maker.
Any life transition such as this can cause
personal adjustment problems.
Interestingly, more and more young adults
are moving back in with their parents.
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Choosing A Career
Choosing a career entails more than mere selection; we
must prepare for any given career as well.
The developmental aim of choosing a career is to “make
something of ourselves” and to provide some stability in
our lives.
Again, such major life transitions can cause
problems of adjustment.
Many young adults today put off higher education and
attend college later as mature adults.
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Establishing Close Relationships
Forming close relationships with
peers is another developmental
task of young adulthood.
Young adults who have yet to find themselves may
be afraid of establishing close ties with someone else.
When intimate, young adult relationships are tentative
or noncommittal, the relationship is unstable and the
more committed partner may feel vulnerable.
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Starting A Family
Young couples today are more thoughtful about marriage
and families. Often the result is to marry and start a family
later than did previous generations.
There is more voluntary childlessness than in the past, too.
Studies show that working parents have fewer hours a
week to spend with their children than in the past.
Women’s educational and career plans
are influenced more heavily by family
needs than are men’s.
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Same Old, Same Old -
Middle Adulthood
Definition:
Middle adulthood can be
categorized as that era
between the late thirties and
the sixties that is generally
characterized by fulfillment of
career and family goals.
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Midlife Transition or Midlife Crisis?
The midlife transition is a period of personal evaluation
that comes sometimes with the realization that one’s life
is about half over.
Some people try to hide the obvious signs of middle age.
There are important changes or transitions that can cause
problems of adjustment at this stage, too.
The death of one’s parents
Children leaving home
Friends and neighbors retiring or moving
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Midlife Transition or Midlife Crisis Cont’d
Middle age need not be a period of instability nor of crisis.
In middle age, our emotions tend to mellow.
In fact, research demonstrates that middle aged adults
report as much happiness and satisfaction as people in
their twenties and thirties.
Various factors are predictive
of happiness and stability in
midlife such as religiosity, a
stable marriage, and good
health.
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Physical And Cognitive Changes
Physical Changes:
At midlife people tend to gain weight around their
middles.
Middle aged people slow down a bit and take
longer to recover from illness.
Having built up some resistance, middle aged
people seem to be less susceptible to disease.
Those individuals who remain physically active also
remain healthier.
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Physical And Cognitive Changes Cont’d
Cognitive Changes
Starting around age 50, people begin to differ
more and more in their cognitive abilities.
Spatial ability and abstract reasoning may begin
to decline.
Alzheimer’s disease, a dementia of old age, can
actually begin at midlife in people manifesting
mild cognitive impairments (MCI).
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Possible Career Changes
Middle aged people who feel they are in
dead-end jobs may seek new jobs or new
careers.
Women react somewhat differently than
men. Women who have worked may make
a late attempt to start a family, while
women who stayed home may return to
the workforce.
Some of the women seeking midlife employment return
to school where they are nontraditional students.
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Sexual Changes
Women
Middle aged women experience menopause, the
cessation of menstruation, which also signals an end
to the childbearing years.
Some women opt to use hormone replacement
therapy to ease the physical symptoms of
menopause. This therapy has recently been shown
to cause serious adverse side effects.
Most middle aged women find other changes (e.g.
caring for elderly parents) to be more distressing
than the changes caused by menopause.
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Sexual Changes Cont’d
Men
Men also experience changes known as the
climacteric, the loss of reproductive capacity.
The climacteric includes the diminution of sexual
vigor, decrease in testosterone secretion, and
reduced fertility.
Men reach the climacteric 5 to 10 years later than
women reach menopause.
Men and women who take these changes in stride
are able to find continued sexual satisfaction in
middle age.
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Aging Gracefully –
Late Adulthood
Definition:
Late adulthood is the final stage of adult
development, from mid-sixties to death and is
characterized by adjustment to changing health,
income, and social roles.
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Introduction
Older people are more likely than
other age groups to encounter
ageism, negative attitudes and
treatment (especially of older
Americans) because of age.
The federal government has age-related protections
in place to prevent discrimination against older
Americans.
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Personal and Social Adjustment
Old age can be an age
of integrity if the elderly
remain active and involved.
Older individuals prefer to control life events themselves
rather than react to what happens to them. That is, they
prefer to maintain an internal locus of control.
For example, most elderly Americans prefer to live in their
own homes rather than in alternative forms of housing.
Older women typically outlive their husbands so have
more adjustments to make.
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Retirement
People’s attitudes about and
reasons for retirement vary
greatly from person to person.
Generally, the more voluntary the retirement,
the better the adjustment to it.
An adequate income is important to successful
retirement; social security alone is no longer
sufficient.
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Retirement Cont’d
Retirement does not cause a decline
in self-esteem.
Older Americans are placing
more importance on postretirement activities such
as volunteer work or parttime employment.
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Successful Aging
Some psychologists support the activity theory of aging;
individuals who remain active age most successfully.
Other psychologists favor the disengagement theory of
aging; individuals who disconnect from society as they
age, age more normally.
It is probably accurate, though, to say
that each person adopts a style of aging
that best suits his or her needs and
personality.
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Successful Aging Cont’d
Older people like to engage in the life review, a
naturally occurring process of self-review prompted
by the realization that life is approaching its end.
These reminiscences help the older person to assess
his or her life as well as leave a record of the past for
others.
Individuals who felt satisfied with their earlier lives
will likely age most successfully.
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