1. Adulthood and Aging
Module 6, Chapter 2

2. Before we start… Brief review of development and adolescence.
Fill out the “Thinking about death” handout.
Answer the essential question:
Would you like to live to be 100? Why or why not?

3. So… what are you doing after you graduate?
College…
What will your major be?
Work force…
What type of job will you do?
Leaving adolescence = making decisions
Where will you live?
Will you marry?
Will you have kids?

4. Social Clock
Societies shared judgment about the “best” timing of certain life events.
Stressful transitions, so many!
Differs for cultures.
Examples:
Drivers’ license
Marriage
Others?

5. Emerging Adulthood Easing slowly into adulthood.
Married, but live at home.
Go home to do laundry.
Get financial help into their 30’s.
Any others?

6. Physical Changes: Peak – mid twenties 36-64 years – noticeable changes
More cautious with physical behavior.
Aging gracefully?
Plastic surgery
Dying hair
Menopause
Menstrual cycle ends
B/t 45-55
Hot flashes?
Decreased levels of estrogen
Depression?
Relief or regret?
No male equivalent
Midlife crisis?

7. Later Adulthood Physical Changes
Sensory losses
Sight, smell, hearing slowly decline.
Muscle strength and stamina decrease.
Bodies require longer recovery time.
Immune systems weaken.
At 65 you have developed antibodies to viruses you have had… so less susceptible to common colds!
Longer reaction time, remembering names, and puzzles.
Brain atrophy, especially in memory areas.
Must exercise the brain just like your body!

8. Disease Related to Aging: Alzheimer’s Disease
Ronald Reagan
3% of the world population has this by 75 years of age.
Progressive and irreversible brain disorder characterized by gradual deterioration of memory, reasoning, language, and physical functioning.
Deteriorating cells have the chemical acetylcholine…
Deals with thinking and memory.
Drugs can slow it down, but there is no cure.
Blood tests…
Would you do it?

9. Disease Related to Aging: Senile Dementia
Another mental disintegration.
Caused by:
Alcohol, tumors, strokes, or anything else related to loss of brain cells.
Likelihood of developing this increases with age.

10. Can you teach an old dog new tricks?
Remember, we are generalizing!
Memory:
Adolescents have the best recall memory.
Recognition – stable from
Habitual tasks harder for elderly to remember.

11. Can you teach an old dog new tricks? (Continued)
Fluid intelligence:
Ability to reason speedily and abstractly.
Used to solve novel logic problems.
Decreases during late adulthood.
Nonverbal intelligence (playing games, puzzle, quilting, etc.)
Mathematicians/scientists do best work in 20’s or 30’s.
Crystallized intelligence:
Accumulated knowledge and verbal skills.
Increases with age.
Verbal intelligence (crossword, convos).
Novelists/philosophers do best work in 40’s, 50’s, 60’s and so on.

12. Social Changes & Transitions
Life events & commitment are behind the biggest transitions.
Erik Erikson (psychosocial development) believes we are healthy if we are generative, meaning focus on supporting future generations, and capable of intimacy.
Sigmund Freud (psychoanalysis) said healthy adults can work and love.

13. Freud: Work 1st career = big decision!
Post college employment is often unrelated to college major.
What matters?
Pay, title, or quality of experience?

14. Freud: Love Love lasts when: 90% population – married at least once.
Intimate self-disclosure
Shared emotional and material support
Similar interests and values.
90% population – married at least once.
Married people report happiness more than single.
Divorce rate – just above 50%
10 studies say living together isn’t the answer.
Kids can bring happiness, but also commitment.
Empty-nest syndrome

15. Ageism: like racism? What stereotypes do we have about older people?
Is this prejudice unfounded?

16. A lifetime of well-being
Just as happy with themselves in older age, as in younger; just as satisfied.
According to studies.
Tend to mellow with age.
Less extreme emotions, more enduring ones.
Translation… less drama!
Most regrets focus on what the person did not do, as opposed to mistakes made while perusing a goal.
Message here?

17. Dying and Death
Death is a part of life, whether it is your own or a loved one.
Grief differs for everyone.
Different cultures:
New status with death.
No crying!
Must cry outward to grieve properly.
Oregon physician assisted suicide law.
Hospice care:
Receive comforting medical attention, sometimes in own home, but avoid death-defying interventions.
Comfort
Dying with dignity
Mourning:
What lessons can we learn?

18. The Dash:
And now only those who loved her know what that little line is worth. For it matters not, how much we own; the cars...the house...the cash, What matters is how we live and love and how we spend our dash. So when your eulogy's being read with your life's actions to rehash Would you be proud of the things they say about how you spent your dash?
I read of a man who stood to speak
He referred to the dates on her tombstone
from the beginning to the end.
He noted that first came the date of birth
and spoke the following date with tears,
but he said what mattered most of all
was the dash between those years.
For that dash represents all the time
that she spent alive on earth