Young adulthood Flashcards
(18 cards)
Compare and contrast criteria for adulthood according to young people across cultures.
Young people from their early teens to their late 20s agreed that the most important markers of the transition to adulthood are:
accepting responsibility for oneself
making independent decisions
becoming financially independent.
These three criteria rank highest not just across cultures and nations, but also across age groups, ethnic groups and social classes.
Anthropologists have found that in virtually all traditional cultures, the transition to adulthood is clearly and explicitly marked by marriage.
Specify the signs of the beginning of physical ageing and when they appear.
Greying of hair occurs in 30s.
About half of men of European background experience substantial hair loss by age 40.
Levels of human growth hormone gradually decline in young adulthood and beyond, causing the skin to become looser and the amount of muscle mass to decrease.
Lung vital capacity decreases beginning at age 25, but only at about 10% per decade.
Decrease in the maximum heart rate, which in turn decreases the amount of oxygen that the heart can deliver to the body. Deposits of cholesterol and fat begin to accumulate in the arteries of the cardiovascular system.
During young adulthood the immune system remains strong but declines in ways that may not yet be detectable. The thymus, a gland in the upper part of the chest, gradually reduces its production of disease-fighting T cells, ceasing entirely by age 50. Production of B cells, a type of immune cell that originates in bone marrow and produces antibodies to destroy bacteria and viruses, also declines.
Explain how obesity is defined, its causes, its consequences and the keys to prevention.
An adult with a BMI of over 25 is classified as overweight, and an adult with a BMI over 30 is obese.
An important physiological change takes place beginning at age 25 in the basal metabolic rate (BMR), which is the amount of energy the body uses when at rest.
Genetics is also a factor. Studies of twins show that weights are more similar in monozygotic (MZ) twins than in dizygotic (DZ) twins, even when the twins grow up in different families.
Researchers have found that a specific protein, leptin, is involved in weight levels in both animals and humans. Leptin is released by fat cells to signal that the body has had enough to eat, and it also influences BMR. Animals and humans with relatively low leptin levels become heavier, have a higher percentage of body fat and lose weight more slowly following a reduction in food intake. Some people appear to have a genetically based resistance to leptin, making obesity more likely.
Adult obesity rates highest in the United States, Mexico, New Zealand and Hungary, while they are lowest in Japan and Korea.
Common problems resulting from obesity in young adulthood are high blood pressure, diabetes, sleep disorders and digestive problems.
Explain the benefits of exercising in young adulthood.
For young adults who do exercise regularly, there are many benefits, especially if it is aerobic exercise that substantially elevates the heart rate for at least 30 minutes.
Aerobic exercise promotes a healthy weight because it reduces body fat. It also increases people’s metabolic rate for several hours, which means that they continue to burn off kilojoules long after they have stopped exercising.
Regular exercise in young adulthood reduces the risk of a variety of illnesses and diseases in middle adulthood, including diabetes, cardiovascular disease and several types of cancer.
It generates brain chemicals called endorphins that provide a pleasurable feeling and increase wellbeing. People who exercise regularly have lower rates of anxiety and depression. Exercise also enhances cognitive functioning.
Low SES females are most likely to not get enough exercise.
Summarise the extent to which IQ scores in childhood and adolescence predict career success in young adulthood.
One meta-analysis of longitudinal studies on intelligence found that scores on IQ tests in childhood were a powerful predictor of income and occupational status in adulthood.
Adults who score in the lowest 25% of the distribution on IQ tests are likely to have trouble performing most kinds of adult work successfully, especially work that involves the use of information and technology.
Adults who score in the highest 25% of the IQ distribution often do well in their careers, in terms of income, advancement and awards. They were also less likely than the people in the comparison group to have personal problems in adulthood, including alcoholism, divorce and mental health issues.
Describe the different components that cultures include as part of their conceptions of intelligence.
Among Chinese adults, for example, intelligence includes features such as humility, self-knowledge and freedom from conventional standards of judgment.
Adults in Zambia emphasise cooperativeness and obedience as qualities of intelligence.
The Yup’ik, a Native Alaskan culture whose daily life is based mainly on hunting and fishing valued practical skills for intelligence and success.
Define expertise and explain why it is often first reached in young adulthood.
One important way cognitive development changes from emerging adulthood to young adulthood is that the focus moves more towards gaining expertise, meaning extensive knowledge and skills in a specific field.
According to scholars in this area, it takes about 10 years of study or practice in most fields to attain expertise. Because most people begin steady work in a specific field sometime in their 20s, expertise is generally first reached a decade later, during the young adult years, at some point in their 30s.
The maturity of the frontal cortex, combined with training in a specific area, promotes the kind of focused attention and goal-directed behaviour that leads to expertise.
A theory proposes that deliberate regular practice in an area can lead to expertise over time, but only among people who possess high abilities in that area.
Explain how creativity is related to expertise and how it changes with age.
A number of studies of people with outstanding accomplishments have found that their creative achievements rise during young adulthood and peak in the late 30s and early 40s, then gradually decline through middle and later adulthood.
According to scholars of creativity, it is only after expertise is established in a field that people are capable of producing creative work.
Gaining expertise enables people to move from problem solving to problem finding as they use their acquired knowledge and skills to think in new ways.
Young adulthood is the life stage when people are most likely to be able to combine expertise with other cognitive qualities that contribute to creativity: openness to new ideas, tolerance for ambiguity and willingness to take intellectual risks.
Eventually, however, expertise becomes a liability. The problems, concepts, materials and ideas people are working with are no longer fresh, and people have more difficulty seeing them in new ways. Their accumulated expertise now tends to steer them down the same paths they have trod many times before, rather than forging new ones. Cognitive flexibility wanes as people find it more difficult to give things a fresh look.
Artists, musicians, inventors, mathematicians and physicists tend to be most creative in their 20s and 30s. In contrast, novelists are often most creative in their 40s, 50s and even 60s.
There are exceptions with exceptionally creative people: Beethoven completed his Ninth Symphony, often considered his best, at the age of 54. Picasso painted important works through his 70s and 80s. Sigmund Freud published Civilisation and Its Discontents, one of his most influential works, in 1930, when he was 74. Joyce Carol Oates (b. 1938) was still writing powerful, popular, critically acclaimed novels in her 70s.
Describe Erikson’s theory of emotional and psychosocial development in young adulthood.
Describe the three qualities in Sternberg’s theory of love and explain how they change with age.
Compare and contrast different cultural traditions regarding marriage and identify the factors that predict marital satisfaction in Western cultures.
Describe the most common causes of divorce in young adulthood and explain why the United States has one of the highest divorce rates in the world.
Appraise common myths about single adults and describe cultural and ethnic variations in singlehood.
Understand LGBTIQ+ partnerships and describe how they have changed in recent years.
Explain why young adulthood tends to be a stage of peak sexual behaviour and identify gender differences in sexuality.
Summarise the social and emotional impact of becoming a parent and describe the unique challenges faced by single parents.
List the stages of occupational development in Super’s theory and explain how personality and gender shape occupational goals.
Explain the relationship between community involvement and media use in the lives of young adults.
