Attitudes toward Aging: A Comparative Analysis of Young Adults from the United States and Germany

Abstract

Social and cultural attitudes toward aging provide a framework for assessing one's own aging experiences as well as one's attitudes toward older men and women. Ageism, or prejudicial attitudes and discriminatory practices toward older adults (Butler, 1980), has been found to be widespread around the world. This study focuses on a comparative analysis of the attitudes of young adults from Germany and the United States. Specifically, the purpose of this study was to evaluate similarities and differences in the anxiety associated with four measurable dimensions associated with ageism: fear of old people, psychological concerns associated with aging, concern over changes in physical appearance as a result of aging, and fear of losses associated with aging. The second purpose of this study was to evaluate the age at which young adults from these two countries might consider themselves to be “old.” The findings indicate significant country and gender differences across the dimensions. German participants tended to view aging much more negatively than American participants did. However, Americans considered themselves to be “old” at a much younger age than Germans. Gender differences indicated that women in both countries were more concerned with age-related changes in their physical appearance than were men. Analyses of the results are discussed in relation to the influence of ageism and negative cultural stereotypes of aging on people's self-image across the life span.

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Andrews

(1999). The seductiveness of agelessness. Aging and Society, 19, 301–318.

Baltes

, & Carstensen

(1996). The process of successful ageing. Ageing and Society, 16, 397–422.

Baltes

P. B.

(1987). Theoretical propositions of life-span development psychology: On the dynamics between growth and decline. Developmental Psychology, 23, 611–626.

Barrow

G. M.

(1992). Aging, the individual and society (5th ed.). St. Paul, MN: West Publishing Company.

Butler

R. N.

(1980). Ageism: A forward. Journal of Social Issues, 36, 8–11.

Butler

R. N.

(1988). Health and aging: The new gerontology. In Schroots

J. J.

Birren

J. E.

, & Svanborg

(Eds.), Health and aging: Perspectives and prospects (pp. 146–153). New York: Springer.

Chrisler

J. C.

, & Ghiz

(1993). Body images issues of older women. In Faces of women and aging. New York: Haworth Press.

Cigler

, & Loomis

(1995). Interest group politics. Washington, DC: Congressional Quarterly Inc.

Cockerham

William C.

(1997). This aging society (2nd ed). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall.

10.

Crawford

M. E.

(2000). Midlife and Beyond. In Vaicunas

J. E.

(Ed.), Women: A feminist psychology (3rd ed.). New York: McGraw-Hill.

11.

de Beauvoir

(1972). The coming of age ( O'Brian

, Trans.). New York: Putnam.

12.

Diener

, & Diener

(1995). Factors predicting the subjective well being of nations. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 64, 851–864.

13.

Featherstone

, & Hepworth

(1990). Images of aging. In Bond

& Coleman

(Eds.), Aging in society, and introduction to social gerontology. London: Sage.

14.

Franzio

S. L.

Kessenich

J. J.

, & Sugrue

P. A.

(1989). Gender differences in the experience of body awareness: An experiential sampling study. Sex Roles, 21(7–8), 499–515.

15.

Gergen

K. J.

(1985). The social constructionist movement in modern psychology. American Psychologist, 40(3), 266–275.

16.

Hamilton

D. L.

, & Sherman

S. J.

(1994). Stereotypes. In Wyer

R. S.

Jr. & Srull

T. K.

(Eds.), Handbook of social cognition (2nd ed.). Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.

17.

Haught

P. A.

Walls

R. T.

Laney

S. D.

Leavell

, & Stuzen

(1999). Child and adolescent knowledge and attitudes about older adults across time and states. Educational Gerontology, 25(6), 501–518.

18.

Hemphill

A. P.

(1995). Greedy geezers. Retrieved 5/2/02, from http://www.allenhephill.com/Geedy_Geezers.html.

19.

Hepworth

(1995). Positive aging, what is the message? In Bunton

Nettelton

, & Burrows

(Eds.), The sociology of health promotion. New York: Routledge.

20.

Higgins

E. T.

(1987). Self-discrepancy: A theory relating self and affect. Psychological Review, 94, 319–340.

21.

Johnson

M. A.

(1989). Variables associated with friendship in an adult population. Journal of Social Psychology, 129(3), 379–390.

22.

Kaschak

(1992). Engendered lives: A new psychology of women's experience. New York: Basic Books.

23.

Krause

(1990). Perceived health problems, formal/informal support, and life satisfaction among older adults. Journal of Gerontology: Social Sciences, 45, 193–205.

24.

Lasher

K. P.

, & Faulkender

P. J.

(1993). Measurement of aging anxiety: Development of the anxiety about aging scale. International Journal of Aging and Human Development, 37(4), 247–259.

25.

Laws

(1995). Understanding ageism: Lessons from feminism and postmodernism. The Gerontologist, 35(1), 112–118.

26.

McConatha

J. T.

McConatha

Deaner

S. L.

, & Dermigny

(1995). A computer-based intervention and therapy of institutionalized older adults. Educational Gerontology, 21, 141–150.

27.

McConatha

J. T.

Schnell

, & McKenna

(1999). Description of older adults as depicted in magazine advertisements. Psychological Reports, 85, 1051–1056.

28.

Myers

P. N.

, & Biocca

F. A.

(1992). The elastic body-image: The effect of television advertising and programming on body image distortions in young women. Journal of Communication, 42, 108–131.

29.

Reinemer

(2001). NCOA survey heralds new age of old age. Retrieved 5/2/02, from (http.www.//noca.org.publications/inno1_01/myths.html).

30.

Singelis

T. M.

(2000). Thoughts on the future of cross-cultural social psychology. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 31(1), 76–91.

31.

Smith

Tom W.

(1987). The polls: The welfare state in cross-national perspective. Public Opinion Quarterly, 51, 404–421.

32.

Sontag

(1972). The double standard of aging. Saturday Review, September 23, pp. 29–38.

33.

Stryker

(1980). Symbolic interactionism: A social structural version. Menlo Park, CA: Benjamin Cummings.

34.

Thimm

Rademacher

, & Kruse

(1998). Age stereotyping and patronizing messages: Features of age-adopted speech in technical instructions to the elderly. Journal of Applied Communication Research, 26(1) 66–82.

35.

Whitbourne

S. K.

(1985). The aging body: Physiological changes and psychological consequences. New York: Springer-Verlag.