Chapter 15:
What is metabolic syndrome?
- A condition characterized by hypertension, obesity, and insulin resistance. Metabolic syndrome often leads to the onset of diabetes and cardiovascular disease.
What is the change is strength, joints and bones in middle adulthood?
- A loss of overall strength but especially occurs in the back and legs. - sarcopenia= age-related loss of muscle mass and strength - Obesity is a risk factor for sarcopenia - The cushions for the movement of bones (such as tendons and ligaments) become less efficient in middle adulthood, a time when many individuals experience joint stiffness and more difficulty in movement. - bone loss begins slowly but accelerates with further aging
What is the change in vision and hearing in middle adulthood?
- Accommodation of the eye—the ability to focus and maintain an image on the retina—experiences its sharpest decline between 40 and 59 years of age. In particular, middle-aged individuals begin to have difficulty viewing close objects. - The reduced blood supply that occurs during this age may decrease the visual field's size and account for an increase in the eye's blind spot. - hearing also can start to decline by age 40 - Sensitivity to high pitches usually declines first; the ability to hear low-pitched sounds does not seem to decline much in middle adulthood.
What is crystallized intelligence?
- Accumulated information and verbal skills, which increase in middle adulthood, according to Horn
What is religion?
- An organized set of beliefs, practices, rituals, and symbols that increases an individual's connection to a sacred or transcendent other (God, higher power, or higher truth).
How does middle adulthood change due to increasing life span?
- As more people live to older ages, the life stage that we think of as middle age seems to be occurring later. A major reason developmentalists are beginning to study middle age is the dramatic i
What is the main cause of death in middle adulthood?
- Chronic diseases are now the main causes of death for individuals in middle adulthood. - many deaths are caused by a single, readily identifiable condition, whereas in old age, death is more likely to result from the combined effects of several chronic conditions - cancer is the leading cause of death followed by cardiovascular disease
What are hormonal changes in middle adulthood men?
- During middle adulthood, most men do not lose their capacity to father children, although there usually is a modest decline in their sexual hormone level and activity - experience hormonal changes in their fifties and sixties, but nothing like the dramatic drop in estrogen that women experience. - Testosterone production begins to decline about 1 percent a year during middle adulthood, and sperm count usually declines slowly, but men do not lose their fertility in middle age.
What is spirituality?
- Experiencing something beyond oneself in a transcendent manner and living in a way that benefits others and society.
What is the impact of stress on the immune system in middle adulthood?
- Immune system functioning becomes less effective with normal aging - high stress weakens immune system further causing higher susceptibility to diseases that increase the inflammation associated with age-related diseases such as cardiovascular disease, type 2 diabetes, arthritis, and some cancers. - The number of white blood cells and their effectiveness in killing viruses or harmful bacteria are related to stress levels. - NK cells are a type of white blood cell that is more likely to be present in low-stress circumstances. Lower levels of NK cells in stressful situations indicate a weakened immune system
What is the change is height and weight in middle adulthood?
- Individuals lose height in middle age, and many gain weight - Being overweight is a critical health problem in middle adulthood
What is the change in cardiovascular system in middle adulthood?
- Midlife is a time when high blood pressure and high cholesterol often take adults by surprise. Cardiovascular disease increases considerably in middle age - Emotional stress likely is an important factor contributing to cardiovascular disease. People who live in a chronically stressed condition are more likely to smoke, overeat, and not exercise. All of these stress-related behaviors are linked with cardiovascular disease. Having a sense of control peaks in middle adulthood and is linked to many aspects of health and disease.
What are the 4 main needs for meaning that guide people to try to make sense of their lives?
- Need for purpose. "Present events draw meaning from their connection with future events." Purposes can be divided into (1) goals and (2) fulfillments. Life can be oriented toward a future anticipated state, such as living happily ever after or being in love. - Need for values. This "can lend a sense of goodness or positive characterization of life and justify certain courses of action. Values enable people to decide whether certain acts are right or wrong." Frank view of meaning in life emphasized values as the main form of meaning that people need. - Need for a sense of efficacy. This involves the "belief that one can make a difference. A life that had purposes and values but no efficacy would be tragic. The person might know what is desirable but could not do anything with that knowledge." With a sense of efficacy, people believe that they can control their environment, which has positive physical and mental health benefits. - Need for self-worth. Most individuals want to be "good, worthy persons. Self-worth can be pursued individually."
What is the observation made or religion in middle adulthood?
- Religion and spirituality are important dimensions of many Americans' lives. Women show a stronger interest in religion and spirituality than men do. - researchers are increasingly finding that religion is positively related to health - can enhance coping for some individuals.
How does sexual activity change in middle adulthood?
- Sexual activity occurs less frequently in middle adulthood than in early adulthood. Nonetheless, a majority of middle-aged adults show a moderate or strong interest in sex.
What is fluid intelligence?
- The ability to reason abstractly, which begins to decline from middle adulthood onward, according to Horn. - spatial awareness
When does stress especially pay a toll?
- The cumulative effect of stress often takes a toll on the health of individuals by the time they reach middle age - chronic stress or prolonged exposure to stressors can have damaging effects on physical functioning, including an unhealthy overproduction of corticosteroids such as cortisol. Chronic stress can interfere with immune functioning, and this stress is linked to disease not only through the immune system but also through cardiovascular factors - cortisol, has been labeled the stress hormone because elevated cortisol levels are linked to physical health problems such as lower immune system functioning and higher blood pressure, cholesterol, and cardiovascular disease, as well as to higher levels of mental health problems such as anxiety and depressive disorder
What is religiousness?
- The degree to which an individual is affiliated with an organized religion, participates in prescribed rituals and practices, feels a sense of connection with its beliefs, and is involved in a community of believers.
What is middle adulthood?
- The developmental period that begins at approximately 40 to 45 years of age and extends to about 60 to 65 years of age. - individuals make choices—selecting what to do, deciding how to invest time and resources, and evaluating what aspects of their lives they need to change
What is the change in lungs in middle adulthood?
- There is little change in lung capacity through most of middle adulthood for many individuals. However, at about age 55, the proteins in lung tissue become less elastic. This change, combined with a gradual stiffening of the chest wall, decreases the lungs' capacity to shuttle oxygen from the air people breathe to the blood in their veins.
What is hormone replacement therapy?
- augments the declining levels of reproductive hormone production by the ovaries. can consist of various forms of estrogen, usually in combination with a progestin - most favorable in reducing negative menopausal symptoms and reducing bone loss or fracture for women 60 years and younger who are within 10 years of menopausal onset. - less favorable for women who are more than 10 or more years from menopausal onset or are 60 years and older because of greater risk for cardiovascular disease and Alzheimer disease. - linked to a slightly higher risk of breast cancer and the longer HRT is taken, the greater the risk of breast cancer
What is testosterone replacement therapy?
- can improve sexual functioning, muscle strength, and bone health. - linked to improved older men's sexual function as well as their mood. Further, another study found that a higher testosterone level was linked to better episodic memory
What is chronic disorders?
- characterized by a slow onset and a long duration. Chronic disorders are rare in early adulthood, increase in middle adulthood, and become common in late adulthood. - arthritis is the leading chronic disorder in middle age, followed by hypertension, but the frequency of chronic disorders in middle age varies by gender. Men have a higher incidence of fatal chronic conditions (such as coronary heart disease, cancer, and stroke); women have a higher incidence of nonfat
What is the change in sleep in middle adulthood?
- eight hours of sleep or more per night are necessary for optimal performance the next day. - Habitual sleep deprivation is linked to morbidity, especially among people with cardiovascular disease
What is the change in practical problem solving in middle adulthood?
- everyday problem solving showed an increase in performance from early adulthood to middle adulthood, with performance then beginning to decrease at about 50 years of age - remains stable in early and middle adulthood but declines in late adulthood.
What challenges do middle adulthood workers face?
- face challenges such as the globalization of work, rapid developments in information technologies, downsizing of organizations, pressure to take early retirement, and concerns about pensions and health care. Midlife job or career changes can be self-motivated or forced on individuals.
What is the change in how life is viewed in middle adulthood?
- finiteness of our existence leads to exploration of meaning in life. Faced with the death of older relatives and less time ahead of them than behind them, many middle-aged individuals increasingly examine life's meaning.
What is perimenopause?
- he transitional period from normal menstrual periods to no menstrual periods at all, which often takes up to 10 years. Perimenopause usually occurs during the forties but can occur in the thirties
What is expertise?
- involves having an extensive, highly organized knowledge and an understanding of a particular domain. Expertise often increases in middle adulthood.
What are the longitudinal changes in intellectual abilities in middle adulthood?
- men/women have peak performance in verbal ability, verbal memory, inductive reasoning, and spatial orientation - Perceptual speed showed the earliest decline - inductive reasoning showed a consistent decline but increased until toward the end
What is the change in speed of info processing in middle adulthood?
- perceptual speed begins declining in early adulthood and continues to decline in middle adulthood. - tested by reaction time test
What are the physical changes in middle adult?
- signs of aging usually are apparent by the forties or fifties. The skin begins to wrinkle and sag because of a loss of fat and collagen in underlying tissues, age spots, especially in areas that are exposed to sunlight, such as the hands and face. Hair becomes thinner and grayer due to a lower replacement rate and a decline in melanin production. Fingernails and toenails develop ridges and become thicker and more brittle, skin is wrinkling, whose bodies are sagging, and whose teeth are yellowing
What is the impact of stress on the cardiovascular system in middle adulthood?
- stress-related behaviors are linked to the development of cardiovascular disease
What is climacteric?
- the midlife transition in which fertility declines.
What is menopause?
- the time in middle age, usually during the late forties or early fifties, when a woman's menstrual periods cease - production of estrogen by the ovaries declines dra- matically, and this decline produces uncomfortable symptoms in some women—"hot flashes," nausea, fatigue, and rapid heartbeat,
What is male hypogondadism?
- used to describe a condition in which the body does not produce enough testosterone
What is the change in memory in middle adulthood?
- verbal memory peaked during the fifties. However, in some other studies verbal memory has shown a decline but most experts conclude that it does decline at some point during this period of adult development - slowdown in learning new information (working memory slows) - Memory decline is more likely to occur when individuals don't use effective memory strategies, such as organization and imagery
What is the highest level of intellectual abilities for middle adulthood?
- vocabulary, verbal memory, inductive reasoning, and spatial orientation
