Ch 13 quiz

Supercentenarians are people who are ____ and older.

110

Which factor most increases the risk of an elderly person suffering mistreatment?

Being frail to the point of dependency on care

According to Erik Erikson's theory on aging, what is the final hurdle that most people who reach old age must overcome?

Despair

How do elderly widows and widowers react to death of their significant other?

Differently: elderly widows often do not remarry while elderly widowers do.

Which of the following is NOT true about old age?

Elderly people lose all appetite and drive for sex.

Who wrote the book On Death and Dying, outlining the five stages of grief?

Elisabeth Kübler-Ross

When elderly people are considered elders and leaders of a group of people, they are functioning under a(n): Question 5 options:

Gerontocracy

No one in the United States can watch the news without hearing about the struggle over Social Security. Which approach has been used in the past to avoid the program's collapse?

Increase the age at which someone can start collecting Social Security.

What is a dependency ratio?

It is the comparison of working people to non-working people.

America's baby boomer generation has contributed to all of the following except:

Medicaid being in danger of going bankrupt

Which assertion about aging in men would be made by a sociologist following the functionalist perspective?

Men who remain active after retirement play supportive community roles.

Which three states allow some form of physician-assisted suicide?

Washington State, Oregon, and Montana

When your mother-in-law fell and broke her hip at age 72, you were concerned because she is still ________________.

Young-old

An older woman retires and completely changes her life. She is no longer raising children or working. However, she joins the YWCA to swim every day. She serves on the Friends of the Library board. She is part of a neighborhood group that plays Bunco on Saturday nights. Her situation most closely illustrates the ______ theory.

activity

In the United States, life expectancy rates in recent decades have ______.

continued to gradually rise

An older man retires from his job, stops golfing, and cancels his newspaper subscription. After his wife dies, he lives alone, loses touch with his children, and stops seeing old friends. His situation most closely illustrates the _______ theory.

disengagement

Today in the United States the poverty rate of the elderly is ______.

increasing

The "graying of the United States" refers to ________.

the increasing percentage of the population over sixty-five years old

What is the approximate median age of the United States?

thirty-seven

Sociologists have adopted the phrase, "the graying of the United States." What does this phrase mean?

The greatest part of the population is reaching the age of 65 and entering old age.