*film What shapes represent past populations? What is the current and future shape of populations?
Past populations: pyramid
Current: barrel shaped society, people living longer
What happens when the elderly internalize negative stereotypes?
Cognition & physical health suffer
Why is raising the age at which one is eligible to receive social security benefits problematic?
affects low income workers who’s jobs are physically draining and live shorter lives
Candice Saunders comments on “brain drain” and how WellStar Health System addressed this problem
Brain drain: losing mastery and experienced workers
Accommodated over 200 unique schedules, invested in workplace flexibility
Physical and sensory changes in early adulthood
• Physical development peaks in early adulthood. – (20’s and early 30’s) then declines
• Sensory sharpness peaks in early 20’s and then begins gradual decline in middle adulthood
– Visual acuity remains good
– Hearing decline beginning in late 20’s/early 30’s
• Both sexes may be graying and losing hair by end of early adulthood
• Skin may begin to loosen, grow less elastic, and wrinkle – More so in women than in men
Stress management tips
• Get in touch with the ways you experience stress.
• Identify stressors such as people and situations.
• Get in touch with the way you handle or don’t handle stress.
• Work on creating better ways to cope with stress.
• Take care of your health.
• Obtain social support.
Crystalized and fluid intelligence
• Improvements
– Retain verbal skills and may improve vocabulary and general knowledge as they age
– Crystallized intelligence increases with age
• Declines
– Memory shows general decline as we age
– Fluid intelligence more likely to decrease with age
Perry’s theory of epistemic cognition (dualistic and relativistic thinking)
• Epistemic cognition
– Concerns our ideas about how we arrive at our beliefs, facts, and ideas
• Students typically begin college with the assumption that there is clearly right and wrong, good versus evil, etc.
– Dualistic thinking
• Students move from dualistic thinking to a deeper way of thinking
– Relativistic thinking
Extrinsic and Intrinsic motives for work
• Extrinsic motives
– Money
– Fringe benefits
– Security
• Intrinsic motives
– The work ethic
– Self-fulfillment
– Self-worth
– Socialization
– Public roles
Super’s 5 stages of career development
• Fantasy stage
– Involves child’s unrealistic conception of self-potential and of the world of work
– Dominates until age 11
• Tentative choice stage: exploring
– From age 11 to 17, focus is on some realistic self- assessment and knowledge of occupations
– Based on interests, abilities, limitations, and glamour
• Realistic choice stage
– After age 17, choices narrow as student weighs job requirements and rewards against interests, abilities, and values
• Maintenance stage
– In later 30’s - settle into career role
– Career continues to develop, and there is a feeling of moving forward
– Job hopping more necessary due to corporate downsizing, mergers, and acquisitions
– Return to school for different training
• may occur out of necessity as well as interest
• Retirement stage
– Individual severs bonds
with the workplace
– retirees often undertake
second or third careers
Individuation in young adulthood
• Young adults go through a process of becoming an individual - individuation
– involves integrating their own values and beliefs with those of their parents and society
Erikson’s intimacy vs. isolation
• Erikson (1963) saw establishment of intimate relationships key “crisis” of early adulthood
• Young adults with firm identity seek to fuse relationships into marriage or abiding friendships.
• Erikson believed it is difficult to commit to others until ego identity is achieved.
• Erikson believed it was normal to develop intimate relationships and bear children within a generally stable and nurturing environment during early adulthood.
Attraction – Elliot & Niesta (2008), Attraction similarity hypothesis
• People develop romantic relationships with others who are similar to themselves in attractiveness and other traits
Sternberg’s Triangular Theory of Love
– 1) Intimacy
– 2) Passion
– 3) Commitment
Marriage, Parenthood, and Divorce
Marriage
– Legitimizes sexual relations
– Provides institution where children can be supported/socialized
– Can assume children had within the marriage are theirs
– Provides sense of security and opportunities to share feelings, experiences
Parenthood
• People in traditional societies report having children to
– strengthen marital bonds
– provide social security
– assist with labor (more hands to help on a farm)
– maintain family lineage; secure property rights and inheritance
– care for one in old age
• Divorce rates in U.S. between 40% and 50%
• Tends to affect women more than men. – Women’s household income drops by 24% – Men’s household income drops by 6%
Physical and sensory changes in middle adulthood
• Gray hair occurs due to the decrease of melanin. – Hair loss accelerates, especially in men
• Sensory functioning
– Vision - presbyopia(ability to focus)
• Reaction time
– Increases as we age due to changes in nervous system
• Lung capacity
– May decline by half between early and late adulthood
Cancer and heart disease
• Screening for prostate, breast, colon, and rectal cancer necessary during middle adulthood.
Heart disease
– Second leading cause of death in middle adulthood
– Leading cause of death in late adulthood
• Heart disease is due to insufficient flow of blood to the heart
– Most commonly results from arteriosclerosis(arteries clog or harden)
• Impairs circulation and increases risk of a blood clot, choking off blood flow
– Most common form - atherosclerosis
Sexuality, Sex hormones and fertility
-most lead rich sex lives
-gradual decline in frequency of sex
• Most common problem of women is
– lack of sexual desire and difficulty becoming sexually aroused
• Most common problem of men is
– erectile dysfunction
• For women, middle adulthood marked by changes in reproductive capacity
– Climacteric
– Perimenopause
– Menopause
• For men, a decline in male sex hormone production and fertility also occurs
– Very gradual process
-no age range men can stop having children
Changes in intellectual abilities (multidirectionality, interindividual variability, plasticity)
Multidirectionality: patterns of change in abilities
Interindividual variability: No two people age in the same way or at the same rate
Plasticity: brains ability to change with learning
Crystallized and Fluid intelligence in middle adulthood
• Crystallized intelligence
– Cluster of knowledge and skills
• Depends on
– accumulated information and experience
– awareness of social conventions
– capacity to make good decisions and judgments
– Increases in middle adulthood
• Fluid intelligence
– Skills/speed at processing/analyzing information
• Ability to comprehend relationships in visual stimuli
– Decreases in middle adulthood
Memory
• As we age,we are less able to-
– keep information in working memory long enough to memorize it
– screen out distractions as we try to focus on material
• However, we are more likely to maintain or expand general knowledge
• Procedural memory can be maintained for a lifetime(riding a bike, driving, etc)
Creativity
• Many people at their height of creativity during middle adulthood
• Age differences in creativity can be found in creative work in
– music, mathematics, and physics
• young adults surpass people in middle adulthood
• Writers and visual artists continue to improve into middle adulthood
Erikson’s generativity vs. stagnation
• Generativity (giving back to community)
– ability to generate or produce; based on instinctual drive toward bearing and rearing children.
• Stagnation (lack of giving back)
– rejection of generativity drive can result in a life stripped of meaning and purpose
Life-events approach to midlife
• Stressful life events in middle adulthood
• Another event at this time – children moving out
Grandparenting
• Grandparents spend a lot of time with grandchildren in recreational and educational activities.
• Grandchildren spend more time with grandmothers than grandfathers all the way through adolescence.
• Grandchildren tend to be more involved with maternal grandparents than paternal grandparents.
• Grandparents have less influence on their grandchildren when they live with them.
involvement of grandmother has positive benefits
• Since 1970, number of U.S. households where grandchildren live with their grandparents has doubled
– Many positive benefits
• Number of grandparents raising grandchildren increasing
– Sometimes done without a parent present
• Skip-generation parent
Sandwich generation
Care for own parents and children
Longevity, Life expectancy, and ageism
Longevity: amount of time we can live under optimal conditions, can live up to 115
Life expectancy: • 77 years for men versus 82 years for women.
Ageism: mistreatment/misunderstanding of the elderly
Physical and sensory changes in late adulthood
• Vision
– presbyopia
– cataracts and glaucoma
• Hearing
– Presbycusis(loss of acuteness in hearing)
– Affects 1 in 3 over 65 years
– Declines more quickly in men than women
• Taste and smell
– Decreases almost ninefold from youth to late adulthood
Osteoporosis
bones lose so much density that they become porous, brittle, and prone to breakage
Approximately10 million people in the U.S. who are 50+ have osteoporosis of the hip (USDHHS, 2005)
Sexuality in late adulthood
-do not lose sexuality
Sexual daydreaming, sex drive, and sexual activity all tend to decline with age
– but sexual satisfaction may remain high
EXCEPT
• Older people with partners usually remain sexually active.
Normal and Pathological aging
– Normal aging(wear & tear)
– Pathological aging(chronic health conditions)
Dementia and Alzheimer’s disease
– Some causes of dementia
• brain infections - meningitis, HIV infection, and encephalitis
• chronic alcoholism, strokes, and tumors
• Most common cause of dementia is Alzheimer’s disease (AD)
– As many as 5 million Americans affected (CDCP, 2014) – 5th leading killer of older Americans
Restrospective and Prospective memory
• Retrospective and prospective memories
– Can be further divided -
– Explicit memory: mem you are aware of
• Episodic and semantic:things that have happened to you
– Implicit memory: mem you don’t have conscious knowledge of
• Automatic – task performance
Erikson’s integrity vs. despair
– Basic challenge
- maintain belief that life is meaningful and worthwhile in the face of physical decline and the inevitability of death
– ego integrity derives from wisdom and acceptance of one’s lifespan as limited and occurring at a certain point in history
– adjustment in the later years requires wisdom to let go
Depression
• About 10% of people aged 65 and above suffer depression
Possibly connected to: chemical imbalances, loss,
• Depression goes undetected, untreated in older people much of the time.
Housing in late adulthood
• They prefer to remain in their homes as long as their physical/mental conditions allow them.
• Older adults reluctant to relocate to nursing homes
- signifies loss of independence.
Elder abuse
Sometimes elderly are abused or neglected, particularly in nursing homes
-sometimes by family
Successful aging
– Physical activity, social contacts, self-rated good health
– The absence of cognitive impairment and depression
– The absence of disabilities and chronic diseases such as arthritis and diabetes
– Not smoking
– Another definition includes high cognitive functioning and high social networking
Kublër Ross and 5 stages of dying
*No set order, all unique experiences
Denial
Anger
Bargaining
Depression
Final acceptance
Hospice care
• Offers palliative care
• Treats the person, not the disease
– Hospice team addresses medical, emotional, psychological, and spiritual needs of patients, family, and friends
• Emphasizes quality rather than length of life
• Considers the entire family to be the unit of care
• Bereavement counseling provided after death
• Support is available to the patient and family (24/7)
Supporting a dying person
• Be there for the person.
– Don’t withhold touching; listen, talk, and share experiences.
• Give them opportunity to talk about death and to grieve.
– Don’t be afraid to talk about ongoing lives of mutual acquaintances.
• Be aware of their emotional state on any given day.
• Don’t minimize their emotional pain or need to grieve by changing the subject or refusing to acknowledge it.
• Be sensitive to their feelings, offering consolation and support.
Coping and helping others cope
• Take care of yourself.
• Allow yourself to feel your loss.
• Don’t reject offers of help from friends and family; tell them what you need.
• Give yourself time to grieve.
• Join a bereavement support group
Helping others
• Spending time with the bereaved person can help.
• Don’t feel that you need to have all the answers – sometimes there are none
• Don’t be afraid to talk about the deceased person, but don’t force talking about them either.
• Keep in touch regularly.
– Offer to help with shopping, running errands, babysitting
