Psychology of the Lifespan

This theorist was the first to propose a five-stage model of dying which begins with denial and ends with acceptance of death.

Elisabeth Kübler-Ross

The term given recently to refer to the transition from adolescence to adulthood that occurs from approximately 18 to 25 years of age.

Emerging adulthood

This theorist proposed eight psychosocial stages of development.

Erik Erikson

This orientation to development stresses that behavior is strongly influenced by biology, is tied to evolution, and is characterized by critical or sensitive periods.

Ethology

Explain ethology and the concept of critical periods.

Ethology stresses that behavior is strongly influenced by biology, is tied to evolution, and is characterized by critical or sensitive periods. These are specific time frames during which, according to ethologists, the presence or absence of certain experiences has a long-lasting influence on individuals. Lorenz coined the term "imprinting" to describe the process of the rapid, innate learning that involves attachment to the first moving object seen. In Lorenz's view, imprinting needs to take place at a certain, very early time in the life of the animal, or else it will not take place. This point in time is called a critical period.

Briefly explain the independent variable and the dependent variable in an experiment. Describe the relationship between them.

Experiments include two types of changeable factors, or variables: independent and dependent. An independent variable is a manipulated, influential, experimental factor. It is a potential cause. The label "independent" is used because this variable can be manipulated independently of other factors to determine its effect. An experiment may include one independent variable or several of them. A dependent variable is a factor that can change in an experiment, in response to changes in the independent variable. As researchers manipulate the independent variable, they measure the dependent variable for any resulting effect.

Explain eclectic theoretical orientation. What is the merit in using such an orientation?

An eclectic theoretical orientation is one which does not follow any one theoretical approach but rather selects from each theory whatever is considered its best features. In this way, you can view the study of development as it actually exists—with different theorists making different assumptions, stressing different empirical problems, and using different strategies to discover information.

An eating disorder that involves the relentless pursuit of thinness through starvation.

Anorexia Nervosa

A group of vitamins that may be able to help slow the aging process and improve the health of older adults.

Antioxidants

A small group that ranges from 2 to about 12 individuals, averaging about 5 to 6 individuals, and can form because adolescents engage in similar activities.

Clique

A term coined by Paul Baltes that refers to the culture-based "software programs" of the mind including such things as reading and writing skills, language comprehension, and daily life skills.

Cognitive pragmatics

The social support model that says that individuals go through life embedded in a personal network of individuals from who they give and receive social support.

Convoy model of social relations

An adolescent group structure that is usually formed based on reputation. Members may or may not spend time together.

Crowd

A kind of (adult) intelligence that consists of one's accumulated knowledge base and verbal skills.

Crystallized intelligence

Coercive sexual activity directed at someone with whom the perpetrator is at least casually acquainted.

Date or acquaintance rape

Define dementia.

Dementia is a global term for any neurological disorder in which the primary symptoms involve a deterioration of mental functioning. Individuals with dementia often lose the ability to care for themselves and can lose the ability to recognize familiar surroundings and people - including family members. It is estimated that 23 percent of women and 17 percent of men 85 years and older are at risk for developing dementia.

What are the characteristics of the formal operational stage?

During the formal operational stage, Piaget's fourth stage of cognitive development, thought is more abstract, idealistic, and logical than during the concrete operational stage. An indication of the abstract quality of adolescents' thought is their increased tendency to think about thought itself. Formal operational thought is also full of idealism and possibilities, especially during the beginning of the formal operational stage, when assimilation dominates. Logical thought also increases as is reflected in adolescents' ability to engage in hypothetical-deductive reasoning, which involves creating a hypothesis and deducing its implications, steps that provide ways to test the hypothesis.

Physical and emotional caretaking for older members of the family, whether by giving day-to- day physical assistance or by being responsible for overseeing such care.

Eldercare

A disease of the eye that is characterized by the deterioration of the macula of the retina which corresponds to the focal center of the visual field.

Macular degeneration

The retention of information about facts, such as general academic knowledge, "everyday knowledge", and information pertaining to one's fields of expertise.

Semantic memory

A form of education that promotes social responsibility and service to the community.

Service learning

This theorist proposed that psychosexual development occurred in the five stages: oral stage, anal stage, phallic stage, latent stage, and genital stage.

Sigmund Freud

A theory of aging suggests that older adults become more selective about their social networks, because they place a high value on emotional satisfaction in their relationships.

Socioemotional selectivity theory

Name one advantage and one disadvantage of using surveys as a way to collect data.

Surveys can be used to study a wide range of topics and can collect data from a large number of people. Surveys can be conducted in person, over the telephone, or on the Internet. A disadvantage to survey research is that people sometimes respond in ways that they think is socially acceptable rather than saying what they honestly think and believe.

What is the "invisible epidemic" among older adults?

The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration has identified substance abuse among older adults as the "invisible epidemic" in the United States. The belief is that substance abuse often goes undetected in older adults, and there is concern about older adults who abuse not only illicit drugs but prescription drugs as well. Too often, screening questionnaires are not appropriate for older adults, and the consequences of alcohol abuse—may erroneously be attributed to other medical or psychological conditions. Because of the dramatic increase in the number of older adults anticipated over the twenty-first century, substance abuse is likely to characterize an increasing number of older adults.

Compare and contrast the cross-sectional and longitudinal approach to research, listing the advantages and disadvantages of both.

The cross-sectional approach is a research strategy that simultaneously compares individuals of different ages. Data are usually collected over a short period of time. The longitudinal approach is a research strategy in which the same individuals are studied over a period of time, usually several years or more. In a cross-sectional study, the researcher does not have to wait for the individuals to grow up or become older. However, it gives no information about how individuals change or about the stability of their characteristics and can obscure the increases and decreases of development. Longitudinal studies address these concerns, but are expensive and time consuming and carry the risk of participants dropping out mid-way.

People who are 85 years and older.

Oldest-old

Describe shrinking of the brain in the aging process.

On average, the brain loses 5 to 10 percent of its weight between the ages of 20 and 90. Brain volume also decreases. One study found that the volume of the brain was 15 percent less in older adults than younger adults. Some areas shrink more than others. The prefrontal cortex is one area that shrinks with aging, and recent research has linked this shrinkage with a decrease in working memory and other cognitive activities in older adults. Scientists think they might result from a decrease in dendrites, damage to the myelin sheath that covers axons, or simply the death of brain cells.

A chronic condition that involves an extensive loss of bone tissue often causing older adults to walk with a marked stoop.

Osteoporosis

A type of dementia that is characterized by muscle tremors, a gradual slowing of movement, and partial facial paralysis.

Parkinson disease

The mental ability to quickly and accurately make simple discriminations in visual stimuli.

Perceptual speed

This refers to the capacity for change.

Plasticity

A new stage of cognitive development that is believed to follow Piaget's fourth state of formal operational thought.

Postformal thought

The ability to remember what one needs to do in the future.

Prospective memory

Theories that describe development as primarily unconscious (beyond awareness) and heavily colored by emotion.

Psychoanalytic theories

A period of rapid physical maturation involving hormonal and bodily changes that occurs primarily during adolescence.

Puberty

What are some of the physical and psychological effects of unemployment?

Researchers have found that unemployment is related to physical problems (such as heart attack and stroke), mental problems (such as depression and anxiety), marital difficulties, and homicide. A 15-year longitudinal study of more than 24,000 adults found that life satisfaction dropped considerably following unemployment and increased after becoming reemployed but did not completely return to the life satisfaction level previous to being unemployed. A recent research review concluded that unemployment was associated with an increased mortality risk for individuals in the early and middle stages of their careers, but the increase was less pronounced for those who became unemployed late in their careers.

A ceremony or ritual that marks an individual's transition from one status to another. These rituals usually focus on the transition to adult status.

Rite of passage

The term given to age-related loss of muscle mass and strength.

Sarcopenia

According to research, what is the best strategy to lose weight?

A recent research review concluded that adults who engaged in diet-plus-exercise programs lost more weight than those who relied on diet-only programs. A study of approximately 2,000 U.S. adults found that exercising 30 minutes a day, planning meals, and weighing themselves daily were the main strategies used by successful dieters as compared with unsuccessful dieters.

Define theory and hypothesis.

A theory is an interrelated, coherent set of ideas that helps to explain phenomena and facilitate predictions. A hypothesis is a specific assumption and prediction that can be tested and determined for accuracy. Hypotheses are formulated in order to test the assumptions of a theory. Results from research based on these hypotheses may, in turn, be used to revise the theory.

Death induced deliberately for a person (who is suffering from an incurable disease or severe disabilities) by injecting a lethal dose of a drug.

Active euthanasia

A document that states such preferences as whether life-sustaining procedures should or should not be used to prolong the life of an individual when death is imminent.

Advance directive

Sustained exercise (e.g., jogging, swimming) that stimulates heart and lung activity.

Aerobic exercise

Prejudice against individuals because of their age, especially prejudice against older adults.

Ageism

A disorder that involves long-term, repeated, uncontrolled, compulsive, and excessive use of alcoholic beverages that impairs the drinker's health and social relationships.

Alcoholism

Briefly describe Alzheimer disease.

Alzheimer disease is a progressive, irreversible brain disorder characterized by gradual deterioration of memory, reasoning, language, and eventually physical functioning. Alzheimer disease involves a deficiency in the important brain messenger chemical acetylcholine, which plays an important role in memory. Also, as Alzheimer disease progresses, the brain shrinks and deteriorates. Because of differences in onset, Alzheimer also is now described as early-onset (initially occurring in individuals younger than 65 years of age) or late-onset (which has its initial onset in individuals 65 years of age and older).

Analyze the terms fluid mechanics and crystallized pragmatics.

As discussed in Chapter 15, crystallized intelligence is an individual's accumulated information and verbal skills and fluid intelligence is one's ability to reason abstractly. According to John Horn, crystallized intelligence continues to increase in middle adulthood, whereas fluid intelligence begins to decline in the middle adulthood years. The distinction between cognitive mechanics and cognitive pragmatics is similar to the one between fluid and crystallized intelligence. The similarity is so strong that some experts now use these terms to describe cognitive aging patterns: fluid mechanics and crystallized pragmatics.

This theorist developed the theory of operant conditioning.

B. F. Skinner

A theoretical perspective that maintains that we can study scientifically only what can be directly observed and measured.

Behaviorism

This is a way of conceptualizing age where age is characterized by physical health and the functional capacities of a person's vital organs.

Biological age

In addition to chronological age, list and briefly describe the three other ways that "age" has been conceptualized.

Biological age is a person's age in terms of biological health and is determined by knowing the functional capacities of a person's vital organs. Psychological age refers to an individual's adaptive capacities compared with others of the same chronological age. Social age refers to connectedness with others and the social roles individuals adopt.

The neurological definition of death that is indicated by no electrical activity in the brain for a specified period of time.

Brain death

List and briefly describe Urie Bronfenbrenner's five environmental systems.

Bronfenbrenner's ecological theory identifies five environmental systems: microsystem, mesosystem, exosystem, macrosystem, and chronosystem. The microsystem is the setting in which an individual lives. The mesosystem involves relations between microsystems or connections between contexts. The exosystem consists of links between a social setting in which the individual does not have an active role and the individual's immediate environment. The macrosystem involves the culture in which individuals live. The chronosystem consists of the patterning of environmental events and transitions as well as sociohistorical circumstances.

Is there any gender difference in the incidence of adolescent depression? What accounts for this gender difference?

By about age 15, adolescent females have a rate of depression that is twice that of adolescent males. Among the reasons for this gender difference are that females tend to ruminate on their depressed mood and amplify it; females' self-images, especially their body images, are more negative than those of males; females face more discrimination than males do; and puberty occurs earlier for girls than for boys. As a result, girls experience a piling up of changes and life experiences in the middle school years that can increase depression.

This theorist referred to midlife as "the afternoon of life".

Carl Jung

A microbiological theory of aging that suggests that human cells are subject to a fixed limit on the number of times they can divide. This decreased ability to divide places an upper boundary on the human life-span potential.

Cellular clock theory

Disorders characterized by a slow onset and a long duration.

Chronic disorders

Define chronic disorders, and briefly describe major chronic conditions affecting the older population

Chronic disorders are characterized by slow onset and long duration. Chronic diseases are rare in early adulthood, increase in middle adulthood, and become more common in late adulthood. Eighty-four percent of U.S. adults 65 years of age and older have one or more chronic conditions, and 62 percent have two or more chronic conditions. Arthritis is the most common chronic disorder in late adulthood, followed by hypertension. Chronic conditions associated with the greatest limitation on work are heart conditions (52 percent), diabetes (34 percent), asthma (27 percent), and arthritis (27 percent).

The midlife transition, for both men and women, in which fertility declines.

Climacteric

A kind of (adult) intelligence that consists of one's ability to reason abstractly.

Fluid intelligence

List Freud's psychosexual stages and explain how adult personality is determined as a result of these stages.

Freud believed that we go through five stages of psychosexual development: oral, anal, phallic, latency, and genital. According to Freud, our adult personality is determined by the way we resolve conflicts between sources of pleasure at each stage and the demands of reality.

A disease of the eye that is characterized by damage to the optic nerve because of the pressure created by a buildup of fluid in the eye.

Glaucoma

A theory of aging that states that aging in the body's hormonal system can lower resistance to stress and increase the likelihood of disease.

Hormonal stress theory

A program committed to making the end of life as free from pain, anxiety, and depression as possible.

Hospice

The self-portrait composed of many pieces.

Identity

This identity status is characterized by both the lack of crisis and the lack of commitment to a self-identity.

Identity diffusion

The belief, reflecting adolescents' egocentrism, that others are as interested in them as they themselves are, as well as attention-getting behavior—attempts to be noticed, visible, and "on stage".

Imaginary audience

The retention of information without conscious recollection, such as the ability to comb one's hair or type on a keyboard.

Implicit memory

Discuss how early or late maturation affects boys and girls.

In the Berkeley Longitudinal Study some years ago, early-maturing boys perceived themselves more positively and had more successful peer relations than did their late-maturing counterparts. When the late-maturing boys were in their thirties, however, they had developed a stronger sense of identity than the early-maturing boys had. For girls, early and late maturation have been linked with body image. In the sixth grade, early-maturing girls show greater satisfaction with their figures than do late-maturing girls, but by the tenth grade late-maturing girls are more satisfied. An increasing number of researchers have found that early maturation increases girls' vulnerability to a number of problems. Early-maturing girls are more likely to smoke, drink, be depressed, have an eating disorder, struggle for earlier independence from their parents, and have older friends; and their bodies are likely to elicit responses from males that lead to earlier dating and earlier sexual experiences. Early maturing girls also are less likely to graduate from high school and they cohabit and marry

What is the argument presented by the evolutionary theory of aging?

In the evolutionary theory of aging, natural selection has not eliminated many harmful conditions and nonadaptive characteristics in older adults because natural selection is linked to reproductive fitness, which is present only in the earlier part of adulthood. For example, consider Alzheimer disease, an irreversible brain disorder, which does not appear until the late middle adulthood or late adulthood years. In evolutionary theory, if Alzheimer disease occurred earlier in development, it may have been eliminated many centuries ago.

According to Erik Erikson's psychosocial theory, this is the name of the eighth and final stage of development.

Integrity versus despair

This Eriksonian researcher proposes that Erikson's theory of identity development contains four statuses of identity, or ways of resolving the identity crisis.

James Marcia

An adolescent who breaks the law or engages in behavior that is considered illegal.

Juvenile Deliquent

A label used to describe the onset of alcoholism after the age of 65.

Late-onset alcoholism

A protein that acts as an antiobesity hormone in humans.

Leptin

The process of looking back at one's life experiences, evaluating them, interpreting them, and often reinterpreting them.

Life review

The maximum number of years an individual can live.

Life span

What is the difference between life span and life expectancy?

Life span is the maximum number of years an individual can live based on biological constraints. Life expectancy is the number of years that will probably be lived by the average person born in a particular year.

A girl's first menstruation.

Menarche

A condition, often occurring in middle and late adulthood, which is characterized by hypertension, obesity, and insulin resistance. This disorder may lead to diabetes and cardiovascular disease.

Metabolic syndrome

Discuss the career challenges faced by middle-aged workers in the 21st century.

Middle-aged workers today face globalization, rapid developments in information technologies, downsizing of organizations, outsourcing of jobs, early retirement, and concerns about pensions and health care. All of these concerns have led to a decreasing sense of personal control for middle-aged workers and delayed plans for retirement.

This theorist studied creative people and coined the term "flow" to describe a heightened state of pleasure experienced when we are engaged in mental and physical challenges that absorb us.

Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

Identify a challenge faced by adult smokers who are trying to quit.

Most adult smokers would like to quit, but their addiction to nicotine often makes quitting a challenge. Nicotine, the active drug in cigarettes, is a stimulant that increases the smoker's energy and alertness, a pleasurable and reinforcing experience. Nicotine also stimulates neurotransmitters that have a calming or pain-reducing effect.

A method of gathering data by means of observing behaviors in real-world settings, making no effort to manipulate or control the situation.

Naturalistic observation

The developmental issue or debate concerning whether development is influenced by biology or environment.

Nature-nurture issue

Discuss the hormonal stress theory of aging.

The hormonal stress theory states that aging in the body's hormonal system may lower resistance to stress and increase the likelihood of contracting a disease. Normally, when people experience stressors, the body responds by releasing certain hormones. As people age, the hormones stimulated by stress remain at elevated levels longer than when people were younger. These prolonged, elevated levels of stress-related hormones are associated with increased risks for many diseases, including cardiovascular disease, cancer, diabetes, and hypertension.

Explore the link between hormones and behavior in adolescence.

The influx of hormones that causes physiological changes in adolescence may also contribute to psychological development. In one study of boys and girls ranging in age from 9 to 14, a higher concentration of testosterone was present in boys who rated themselves as more socially competent. However, hormonal effects by themselves do not account for adolescent development. For example, in one study, social factors were much better predictors of young adolescent girls' depression and anger than hormonal factors. Behavior and moods also can affect hormones. Stress, eating patterns, exercise, sexual activity, tension, and depression can activate or suppress various aspects of the hormonal system. In sum, the hormone-behavior link is complex.

The mental "workbench" in the mind where individuals manipulate information and solve problems.

Working memory

This Austrian psychiatrist, a concentration camp survivor, wrote the book "Man's Search for Meaning", where he proposed that the human qualities of spirituality, freedom, and responsibility were the key to finding one's true meaning in life (and death).

Viktor E. Frankl

In what circumstances are adolescents likely to feel more comfortable disclosing information to their parents?

When parents engage in positive parenting practices, adolescents are more likely to disclose information. For example, disclosure increases when parents ask adolescents questions and when adolescents' relationship with parents is characterized by a high level of trust, acceptance, and quality. Researchers have found that adolescents' disclosure to parents about their whereabouts, activities, and friends is linked to positive adolescent adjustment.

What role does the top-dog phenomenon play when adolescents make the transition to middle or to junior high school?

When students make the transition to middle or junior high school, they experience the top-dog phenomenon, moving from being the oldest, biggest, and most powerful students in the elementary school to being the youngest, smallest, and least powerful students in the middle or junior high school. This could potentially cause a drop in school satisfaction and cause stress.

Discuss the impact of working while in college.

Working can pay or help offset some costs of schooling, but one national study found that, for those who identified themselves primarily as students, their grades suffered as the number of hours worked per week increased. Jobs also can contribute to one's education. Many colleges in the United States offer cooperative (co-op) programs, which are paid apprenticeships in a field that one is interested in pursuing. Other useful opportunities for working while going to college include internships and part-time or summer jobs relevant to your field of study. Participating in these work experiences can be a key factor in landing the job you want when you graduate.