SOCIOLOGY Richard T' Schaefer

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SOCIOLOGYRichard T. Schaefer
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Stratificationby Age
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13. Stratification by Age

• Aging and Society
• Explaining the Aging Process
• Role Transitions Throughout the Life Course
• Age Stratification in the United States
• Social Policy and Age Socialization

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Aging and Society

• Age stratification varies from culture to culture

• Being old is master status that commonly
  overshadows all others in U.S.
• Once people labeled old this designation has
  major impact on how others perceive them and how
  individuals view themselves

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Aging and Society

• Properties of minority or subordinate groups

• Experience unequal employment treatment
• Share physical characteristics
• Membership is involuntary
• Strong sense of group solidarity
• Generally married to others of comparable age

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Explaining the Aging Process

• Increase in life expectancy led to referring to
  people in their 60s as the young old

Gerontology Scientific study of the sociological
and psychological aspects of aging and problems
of the aged
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Explaining the Aging Process

• Functionalist Approach

• Disengagement Theory
• Society and aging individuals mutually sever many
  of their relationships
• Interactionist Approach
• Activity Theory
• Elderly persons who remain active and socially
  involved are best-adjusted
• The Conflict Approach
• Elderly victimized by social structure
• Social roles relatively unchanged but devalued

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Explaining the Aging Process

• Table 13-1. Theoretical Perspectives on Aging

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Role Transitions Throughout the Life Course

• Midlife Crisis A period during which adults
  realize that they have not achieved basic goals
  and ambitions and have little time left to do so

• The Sandwich Generation
• Adults who simultaneously try to meet the
  competing needs of their parents and of their own
  children

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Role Transitions Throughout the Life Course

• Figure 13-1. Developmental and
• Transitional Periods in Adulthood

Source D. Levinson 199618
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Role Transitions Throughout the Life Course

• Adjusting to Retirement

• Rite of passage
• Marks critical transition from one phase of a
  persons life to another

Pre-retirement Near phase Honeymoon
phase Disenchantment phase Reorientation
phase Stability phase Termination phase
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Role Transitions Throughout the Life Course

• Figure 13-2. Retirement Expectations

Source AARP 1999
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Role Transitions Throughout the Life Course

• Death and Dying

• Kubler-Ross research greatly encouraged open
  discussion of the process of dying
• Functionalists see those who are dying as
  fulfilling distinct social functions.
• Hospice care Good death by improving dying
  persons last days
• Studies in U.S. suggest people are breaking
  through historic taboos about death

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Age Stratification in the United States

• The Graying of America

• In 1900 4.1 of the population of the United
  States was age 65 or older.
• By 2010 13 of the population of the United
  States will be age 65 or older.
• Highest proportions of older people in Florida
  Pennsylvania Rhode Island Iowa West Virginia
  and Arkansas

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Age Stratification in the United States

• Figure 13-3. Actual and
• Projected Growth of the
• Elderly Population of
• the United States

Source Bureau of the Census 1975 2004a
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Age Stratification in the United States

• Figure 13-4. Twenty-Eight Floridas by 2030

Source Bureau of the Census 2005a
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Age Stratification in the United States

• Wealth and Income

• Typical older person has standard of living
  higher than in the nations past
• Ageism
• Prejudice and discrimination based on a persons
  age
• Competition in the Labor Force
• Older workers face discrimination in the labor
  force

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Age Stratification in the United States

• The Elderly Emergence of a Collective
  Consciousness

• Awareness of the social power of the elderly is
  growing
• AARP is third largest volunteer organization in
  the U.S.
• Formation of organizations for elderly homosexuals

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Social Policy and Age Socialization

• The Right to Die Worldwide
• The Issue

• Physician-assisted suicide one aspect of larger
  debate in U.S.
• Euthanasia act of bring about the death of a
  hopelessly ill and suffering person
• Public opinion on euthanasia divided

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Social Policy and Age Stratification

• The Right to Die Worldwide
• The Setting

• Many societies practiced senilicide killing the
  old because of extreme difficulties in providing
  basic necessities
• Public policy in U.S. does not permit active
  euthanasia
• Greater tolerance for passive euthanasia

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Social Policy and Age Stratification

• The Right to Die Worldwide
• Sociological Insights

• Informal norms seem to permit mercy killings
• Conflict theorists ask questions about the values
  raised by such decisions
• Critics of euthanasia charge supporters of ageism
  and other forms of bias

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Social Policy and Age Stratification

• The Right to Die Worldwide
• Policy Initiatives

• In the industrialized world euthanasia is widely
  accepted only in the Netherlands.
• Medical and technological advances cannot provide
  answers to complex ethical legal and political
  questions.