Late Adulthood: Psychosocial Development

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Part VIII
Chapter Twenty-Five

• Late Adulthood Psychosocial Development

Theories of Late Adulthood Coping with
Retirement Friends and Relatives The Frail Elderly
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Late Adulthood Psychosocial Development

• the range of possibilities for life after age 65
  is vast, greater than at any earlier age
• people in late adulthood take comfort in
• family
• pleasure in their daily routines
• current events

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Theories of Late Adulthood

• Self Theories
• theories of late adulthood that emphasize the
  core self, or the search to maintain ones
  integrity and identity

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Theories of Late Adulthood

• Integrity Versus Despair
• the final stage of Erik Eriksons developmental
  sequence, in which older adults seek to integrate
  their unique experience with their vision of
  community

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Theories of Late Adulthood

• Identity theory
• Eriksons fifth stage, identity versus role
  confusioneach new experience, each gain or loss,
  requires a reassessment of identity
• identity is challenged in old age
• the usual pillars of self-concept crumble
• appearance, health and employment

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Theories of Late Adulthood

• Selective Optimization
• this concept is central to self
  theoriesindividuals can set goals, assess their
  own abilities, and figure out how to accomplish
  what they want to achieve despite the limitation
  and declines of later life

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Theories of Late Adulthood

• Stratification Theories
• theories that emphasize that social forces,
  particularly those related to a persons social
  stratum or social category, limit individual
  choices and affect the ability to function in
  late adulthood as past stratification continues
  to limit life in various ways

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Theories of Late Adulthood

• Stratification by Age
• as they grow older, people may be consigned to
  their own places and activities
• industrialized nations segregate older people

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Stratification by Age

• Disengagement Theory
• aging makes a persons social sphere increasingly
  narrow, resulting in role relinquishment,
  withdrawal, and passivity
• Activity Theory
• elderly people want and need to remain active in
  a variety of social spheresbecome withdrawn only
  unwillingly, as a result of ageism

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Stratification by Gender

• feminist theory draws attention to gender
  separation
• a disproportionate number of the elderly are
  female
• everywhere older women are segregated and as a
  result poorer than old men

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Theories of Late Adulthood

• Ethnic Discrimination
• critical race theory sees ethnicity and race as
  social construct whose practical utility is
  determined by a particular society or social
  system
• long-standing ethnic discrimination and racism
  results in stratification, shaping experience and
  attitude throughout the life span

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Theories of Late Adulthood

• Better to Be Female, Non-European, and Old?
• African and Hispanic Americans are often nurtured
  and respected within their families and churches
• Asian and Hispanic elders often outlive European
  American contemporaries

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Dynamic Theories

• focus on the transformations of late adulthood
  and on how individuals react to such events
• emphasize change and readjustment rather than
  either the ongoing self or the impact of
  stratification
• each persons life is seen as an active,
  ever-changing, largely self-propelled process
• Continuity Theory
• each person experiences the changes of late
  adulthood and behaves toward others in much the
  same way he or she did in earlier periods of life

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Coping with Retirement

• Deciding When to Retire
• social scientists and political leaders have
  assumed that older adults wanted employment
• recent sociological and psychological research
  has found that most older adults want to stop
  working as soon as they are eligible

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Coping with Retirement

• Retirement and Marriage
• research says that it is best for both spouses to
  retire together
• neither is satisfied if the other is still
  working and making family decisions

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Coping with Retirement

• Aging in Place
• refers to a preference of elderly people to
  remain in the same home and community, adjusting
  but not leaving when health fades

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Coping with Retirement

• Continuing Education
• retirement offers the time and opportunity to
  take classes
• 1 out of 4 U.S. adults age 66 and older were
  enrolled in continuing education in 2005

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Coping with Retirement

• Volunteer Work
• is suitable for elderly people who have adequate
  pensions or other sources of income
• volunteering allows the elderly to gain status
  and to find new meaning

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Coping with Retirement

• Religious Involvement
• studies show that religious involvement of all
  kinds correlates with physical and emotional
  health as well as long life

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Coping with Retirement

• Political Activism
• the elderly are more politically active
• frequently write to their elected representatives
• vote in off-year elections
• identify with a political party
• join groups that lobby

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Coping with Retirement

• AARP
• a U.S. organization of people aged 50 and older,
  which advocates for the elderlyit was originally
  called the American Association of Retired
  Person, but the organizations members do not
  have to be retired

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Friends and Relatives

• Long-Term Marriages
• a spouse buffers against the problems of old age
  and extends life
• personal happiness increases with the quality of
  the marriage or intimate relationship
• mutual respect

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Friends and Relatives

• Losing a Spouse
• widowhood among elderly is common and
  problematicespecially the first two years after
  death
• women tend to marry older men and live longer
  than men

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Friends and Relatives

• Relationships with Younger Generations
• older adults live to see two or more generations
  of younger family members
• more adults are having one childmany children
  will have no aunts, uncles, cousins, brothers, or
  sisters

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Friends and Relatives

• Adult Children
• engagement and interaction are common between
  older adults and their grown children
• assistance arises both from need and from the
  ability to provide
• personal contact depends mostly on geographical
  proximity
• affection is influenced by the pairs history of
  mutual love and respect
• sons feel stronger obligation daughters feel
  stronger affection

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Friends and Relatives

• Adult Children
• as parent grow older, every family needs to
  adjust to changing conditions and circumstance
  renegotiating relationships
• filial responsibility
• the idea that adult children are obligated to
  care for their aging parents

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Friends and Relatives

• The three approaches to Grandparenting
• Remote Grandparents
• Companionate Grandparents
• Involved Grandparents

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Friends and Relatives

• Friendship
• quality, not quantity, of friendship is crucial
• having at least one close confidant acts as a
  buffer against many forms of lost status, poor
  health and reduced companionship

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The Frail Elderly

• Frail Elderly
• people over age 65 who are physically infirm,
  very ill, or cognitively impaired

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The Frail Elderly

• Activities of Daily Life (ADL)
• actions that are important to independent living,
  typically consisting of five tasks of self-care
  eating, bathing, toileting, dressing, and
  transferring from a bed to a chairthe inability
  to perform any of these tasks is a sign of frailty

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The Frail Elderly

• Instrumental Activities of Daily Life (IADL)
• actions that are important to independent living
  and that require some intellectual competence and
  forethoughtthe ability to perform these tasks is
  even more critical to self-sufficiency than ADL
  ability

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Caring for the Frail Elderly

• The Demands of Family Care
• often caregivers of the elderly are themselves
  elderly
• caregivers often experience substantial stress
• sometimes caregivers feel fulfilled by their
  experiences
• designated caregivers are often chosen less for
  practical reason than because of cultural
  expectation
• Respite Care
• an arrangement in which a professional caregiver
  relieves a frail elderly persons usual family
  caregiver for a few hours each day or for an
  occasional weekend

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Caring for the Frail Elderly

• Elder Abuse
• analysis of elder abuse is complicated because
  three distinct elements contribute to the
  problem
• the victim
• the abuser
• the setting

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Caring for the Frail Elderly

• Long-Term Care
• assistant living
• provides some of the privacy and independence of
  living at home, along with some medical
  supervision