Middle Adulthood/ Middle Age

INTRODUCTION

— from approximately ages 40-60 y

— declining physical skills

— increasing responsibilities

— increasing self-satisfaction

— increasing awareness of time (past, future)

PHYSICAL DEVELOPMENT

— mostly gradual changes

— decreasing height / increasing weight

— after 55, approximately 2 inches lost for men, 1 inch for women

— decreasing bone density (for women, loss is twice as fast)

— decreasing strength

— 10% loss by 60 y

— decreasing vision, light sensitivity

— decreasing hearing (especially high frequencies)

— decreasing kidney function (50% decrease)

— decreasing cardiac output (1/2 of that of 20 year-old)

COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT

1. Responsibility and Executive Thinking

— recall Shaie: early adulthood is an achieving stage

— middle adulthood involves what is called the responsible stage in cognition

— decision making is based upon personal responsibilities towards others

— can lead to what is called the executive stage

— in this stage, the adult will apply post-formal thinking to executive

decisions

— in this way, the decision meets the needs of competing groups, agencies,

etc.

2. Cognitive Decline

— two views:

i/ cross-sectional studies

— compare cohorts of different ages

— Horn, 1980's:

— individuals in middle adulthood less able to reason abstractly

— but, is this due to age differences in abilities or to a cohort effect?

— individuals at different ages have different education, training, etc.

ii/ Seattle Longitudinal Study

— longitudinal studies follow the same individuals and assess them several

times in their lives

— compare same individual at different ages

— therefore, effects not result of different cohorts

— in this study, the same men followed since 1950's

— declines found in:

i) perceptual speed (ability to make visual discriminations)

ii) numerical ability (simple arithmetic calculations)

— some abilities peaked