The present research investigated the hypotheses that elderly people can be reminders of our mortality and that concerns about our own mortality can therefore instigate ageism. In Study 1, college-age participants who saw photos of two elderly people subsequently showed more death accessibility than participants who saw photos of only younger people. In Study 2, making mortality salient for participants increased distancing from the average elderly person and decreased perceptions that the average elderly person possesses favorable attitudes. Mortality salience did not affect ratings of teenagers. In Study 3, these mortality salience effects were moderated by prior reported similarity to elderly people. Distancing from, and derogation of, elderly people after mortality salience occurred only in participants who, weeks before the study, rated their personalities as relatively similar to the average elderly person’s. Discussion addresses distinguishing ageism from other forms of prejudice, as well as possibilities for reducing ageism.
Aiken, L. S., & West, S. G. (1991). Multiple regression: Testing and interpreting interactions. London: Sage.
2.
Arndt, J., Greenberg, J., Solomon, S., Pyszczynski, T., & Schimel, J. (1999). Creativity and terrormanagement: Evidence that creative activity increases guilt and social projection following mortality salience. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 77, 19-32.
3.
Arndt, J., Greenberg, J., Solomon, S., Pyszczynski, T., & Simon, L. (1997). Suppression, accessibility of death-related thoughts, and cultural worldview defense: Exploring the psychodynamics of terror management. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 73, 5-18.
4.
Barnett, P. A., & Gotlib, I. H. (1988). Psychosocial functioning and depression: Distinguishing among antecedents, concomitants, and consequences. Psychological Bulletin, 104, 97-126.
5.
Becker, E. (1971). The birth and death ofmeaning. New York: Free Press.
6.
Becker, E. (1973). The denial of death. New York: Free Press.
7.
Becker, E. (1975). Escape from evil. New York: Free Press.
8.
Ben-Ari, O. T., Florian, V., & Mikulincer, M. (1999). The impact of mortality salience on reckless driving: A test of terror management mechanisms. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 71, 35-45.
9.
Bennett, M. A. (2002). The therapist’s transference: Younger therapists working with older adults. Dissertation Abstracts International, 63(5-B), 25-73.
10.
Braithwaite, V. (2002). Reducing ageism. In T. D. Nelson (Ed.), Ageism: Stereotyping and prejudice against older people (pp. 311-337). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
11.
Castano, E., Yzerbyt, V., & Paladino, M. (2002). I belong, therefore, I exist: Ingroup identification, ingroup entitativity, and ingroup bias. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 28, 135-143.
12.
Cuddy, A. J. C., & Fiske, S. T. (2002). Doddering but dear: Content, and functioning in stereotyping of older persons. In T. D. Nelson (Ed.), Ageism: Stereotyping and prejudice against older people (pp. 3-26). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
13.
Davis-Berman, J. (1998-1999). Attitudes toward aging and death anxiety: Aging and death class. Omega: Journal of Death& Dying, 38, 59-64.
14.
de Beauvoir, S. (1972). The coming of age. New York: G. P. Putnam.
15.
Dechesne, M., Greenberg, J., Arndt, J., & Schimel, J. (2000). Terror management and the visissitudes of sports fan affiliation: The effects of mortality salience on optimism and fan identification. European Journal of Social Psychology, 30, 813-835.
16.
Depaola, S. J., Griffin, M., & Young, J. R. (2003). Death anxiety and attitudes toward the elderly among adults: The role of gender and ethnicity. Death Studies, 27, 335-354.
17.
Dijksterhuis, A.,& van Knippenberg, A. (1998). The relation between perception and behavior, or how to win a game of Trivial Pursuit. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 74, 865-877.
18.
Dovidio, J. F., Kawakami, K., Johnson, C., Johnson, B., & Howard, A. (1997). On the nature of prejudice: Automatic and controlled processes. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 33, 510-540.
19.
Esposito, J. L. (1987). The obsolete self: Philosophical dimensions of aging. Los Angeles: University of California Press.
20.
Goldenberg, J. L., McCoy, S. K., Pyszczynski, T., Greenberg, J., & Solomon, S. (2000). The body as a source of self-esteem: The effect of mortality salience on identification with one’s body, interest in sex, and appearance monitoring. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 79, 118-130.
21.
Greenberg, J., Pyszczynski, T., & Solomon, S. (1986). The causes and consequences of a need for self-esteem: A terrormanagement theory. In R. F. Baumeister (Ed.), Public and private self (pp. 189-212). New York: Springer-Verlag.
22.
Greenberg, J., Pyszczynski, T., Solomon, S., Rosenblatt, A., Veeder, M., Kirkland, S., et al. (1990). Evidence for terror management theory II: The effects of mortality salience on reactions to those who threaten or bolster the cultural worldview. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 58, 308-318.
23.
Greenberg, J., Pyszczynski, T., Solomon, S., Simon, L., & Breus, M. (1994). Role of consciousness and accessibility of death-related thoughts in mortality salience effects. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 67, 627-637.
24.
Harmon-Jones, E., Greenberg, J., & Solomon, S. (1996). The effects of mortality salience on intergroup bias between minimal groups. European Journal of Social Psychology, 26, 677-681.
25.
Hunter, K. I., Linn, M. W., & Pratt, T. C. (1979). Minority women’s attitudes about aging. Experimental Aging Research, 5, 95-108.
26.
Jung, C. G. (1959). Aion researches in the phenomenology of the self. (R. F. C. Hull, Trans.). InH. Read, M. Fordham, & G. Adler (Eds.), The collected works of C. G. Jung(Vol. 9, Part 2). Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. (Original work published 1951)
27.
Kite, M. E., & Johnson, B. T. (1988). Attitudes toward older and younger adults: A meta-analysis. Psychology and Aging, 6, 19-27.
28.
Kite, M. E., & Wagner, L. S. (2002). Attitudes toward older adults. In T. D. Nelson (Ed.), Ageism: Stereotyping and prejudice against older people (pp. 129-200). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
29.
Krueger, J., & Clement, R. W. (1994). The truly false consensus effect: An ineradicable and egocentric bias in social perception. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 67, 596-610.
30.
Lang, F. R., & Carstensen, L. L. (2002). Time counts: Future time perspective, goals, and social relationships. Psychology and Aging, 17, 125-139.
31.
Langer, S. K. (1982). Mind: An essay on human feeling(Vol. 3). Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press.
32.
Maglio, C. J.,& Robinson, S. E. (1994). The effects of death education on death anxiety: Ameta-analysis. Omega: Journal of Death& Dying, 29, 319-335.
33.
McConnell, A. R., & Leibold, J. M. (2001). Relations among the Implicit Association Test, discriminatory behavior, and explicit measures of racial attitudes. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 37, 435-442.
34.
McGregor, H. A., Lieberman, J. D., Greenberg, J., Solomon, S., Arndt, J., Simon, L., et al. (1998). Terror management and aggression: Evidence that mortality salience motivates aggression against worldview-threatening others. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 74, 590-605.
35.
McGregor, I., Zanna, M. P., Holmes, J. G., & Spencer, S. J. (2001). Compensatory conviction in the face of personal uncertainty: Going to extremes and being oneself. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 80, 472-488.
36.
Montepare, J. M., & Zebrowitz, L. A. (2002). A social-developmental viewof ageism. InT. D. Nelson (Ed.), Ageism: Stereotyping and prejudice against older people (pp. 77-125). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
37.
Nelson, L. J., Moore, D. L., Olivetti, J., & Scott, T. (1997). General and personal mortality salience and nationalistic bias. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 23, 884-892.
38.
Nelson, T. D. (2002). Preface. In T. D. Nelson (Ed.), Ageism: Stereotyping and prejudice against older people (pp. ix-xiv). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
39.
Oatley, K., & Bolton, W. (1985). A social-cognitive theory of depression in reaction to life events. Psychological Review, 92, 372-388.
40.
Palmore, E. (1999). Ageism: Negative and positive. (1999). New York: Springer.
41.
Pasupathi, M., & Lockenhoff, C. E. (2002). Ageist behavior. In T. D. Nelson (Ed.), Ageism: Stereotyping and prejudice against older people (pp. 201-246). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
42.
Perdue, C. W., & Gurtman, M. B. (1990). Evidence for the automaticity of ageism. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 26, 199-216.
43.
Pyszczynski, T., Greenberg, J., Solomon, S., Cather, C., Gat, I., & Sideris, J. (1995). Defensive distancing from victims of serious illness: The role of delay. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 21, 13-20.
44.
Pyszczynski, T., Greenberg, J., Solomon, S., Sideris, J.,& Stubing, M. J. (1993). Emotional expression and the reduction of motivated cognitive bias: Evidence from cognitive dissonance from victims’ paradigms. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 64, 177-186.
45.
Rodin, J., & Langer, E. (1980). Aging labels: The decline of control and the fall of self-esteem. Journal of Social Issues, 36, 12-29.
46.
Rosenblatt, A., Greenberg, J., Solomon, S., Pyszczynski, T.,& Lyon, D. (1989). Evidence for terror management theory I: The effects of mortality salience on reactions to those who violate or uphold cultural values. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 57, 681-690.
47.
Schimel, J., Pyszczynski, T., Greenberg, J., O’Mahen, H., & Arndt, J. (2000). Running fromthe Shadow: Psychological distancing from others to deny characteristics people fear in themselves. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 78, 446-462.
48.
Schwiebert, D. C. (1978). Unfavorable stereotyping of the aged as a function of death anxiety, sex, perception of elderly relatives, and a death anxiety-repression interaction. Dissertation Abstracts International, 39(6-B), 3007-3007.
49.
Shanks, A. Z. (1976). Old is what you get: Dialogues on aging by the old and young. New York: Viking.
50.
Simon, L., Greenberg, J., Arndt, J., Psyzczynski, T., Clement, R., & Solomon, J. (1997). Perceived consensus, uniqueness, and terror management: Compensatory responses to threats to inclusion and distinctiveness. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 23, 1055-1065.
51.
Taylor, S. E., & Brown, J. D. (1994). Positive illusions and well-being revisited: Separating fact from fiction. Psychological Bulletin, 116, 21-27.
52.
Taylor, S. E., & Mettee, D. R. (1971). When similarity breeds contempt. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 20, 75-81.
53.
van den Bos, K. (2001). Uncertainty management: The influence of uncertainty salience on reactions to perceived procedural fairness. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 80, 931-941.
54.
van den Bos, K., & Miedema, J. (2000). Toward understanding why fairness matters: The influence of mortality salience on reactions to procedural fairness. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 79, 355-356.
55.
Watson, D., & Clark, L. A. (1991). Self-versus peer ratings of specific emotional traits: Evidence of convergent and discriminant validity. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 60, 927-940.
