ACTIVE LIFE EXPECTANCY

Measure of the number of years a person can expect to live without a disability.

ACTIVITIES OF DAILY LIVING

(ADL's)

Measure of need for help with basic functions such as eating, bathing, dressing, getting to and from the bathroom, getting in and out of bed, and walking.

ACTIVITY THEORY

ADAPTION

A range of behaviors to meet demands; includes developing habits to confront problems and manage frustration and anxiety.

AGE COHORT

Refers to people who were born at the same time and thus share similar experiences.

AGE DISCRIMINATION

Negative behavior toward olders people; acting on the basis of stereotypes.

AGE EFFECT

A difference due to chronological age or life course stage.

AGE GRADE

Use of age as a social category to group people by status-the expectations for when the transition from one role to another whould occur.

AGE INTEGRATION THEORY

A theory that recognizes that societies have both age-segregated and age-integrated institutions that can either impede or enhance the participation of the aged.

AGEISM

A systematic stereotyping of discrimination against people because they are old.

AGE STRATIFICATION THEORY

Underlying proposition is that all societies group people into social categories and that these groupings provide people with social identities; age is one principle of ranking, along with wealth, gender, and race.

AGE STRUCTURE

The distribution of people across various age cohorts.

AGE 30 TRANSITION

One of Levinson's developmental periods of adulthood; major tasks in this period are establishing a niche in society and developing competence in a chosen craft and then working at succeeding.

AGE TIMETABLE

Similar to age norms but looser and more flexible; informal rules, which specify age-appropriate roles and behavior.

ALZHEIMER'S DISEASE

Severe organic deterioration of the brain that affects memory, cognitive functions, and personality to a degree sufficient to interfere with normal activities and social functioning; symptoms include impairment of memory, intellect, judgement, and orientation and excessive or shallow emotions; the most common type of dementia. 

ANGINA

Chest pain that may precede a heart attack.

APHASIA

Involves damage to the speech and language centers in the brain; one of the consequences of a stroke; occurs when the brain is deprived of oxygen; patients may be unable to produce meaningful speech or to understand spoken or written language.

ARTHRITIS

A chronic disease that causes joint inflammation and its consequences of pain; swelling and deformity.

BABY BOOMERS

The generation of Americans born between 1946 and 1964.

BASAL CELL CARCINOMA

Common type of skin cancer; easily cured.

CATARACT

A condition in which the lens of the eye becomes cloudy, and light cannot penetrate.

CENTRAL NERVOUS SYSTEM

(CNS)

The brain and spinal cord.

CEREBELLUM

A brain structure involved in body movements and, to some degree, balance; located at the back and base of the brain; essential in the fine-tuning of voluntary and involuntary muscular movements.

CHILD DEPENDENCY RATIO

The number of persons younger than 18 relative to those of working age.

CHRONOLOGICAL AGE

Number of years a person has lived.

CLASSIC AGING PATTERN

Age-related declines in verbal and performance intelligence amoung people 60 and older.

CLINICAL DEPRESSION

A set of symptoms that includes depressed mood, loss in pleasurable acitivities, loss of appetite, sleep disturbance, fatigue, feelings of worthlessness and guilt, difficulties in thinking and concentration, psychomotor disturbances, and suicidal notions.

COGNITIVE PSYCHOLOGY

The study of mental processes.

COHORT

The aggregate of individuals who experienced the same event within the same time interval.

COHORT AGING

The continuous advancement of a cohort from one age category to another over its life span.

COHORT EFFECT

A difference due to the experiences or characteristics of the particular cohort to which individual belongs.

CONGESTIVE HEART FAILURE

A condition in which the heart's function as a pump is inadequate to meet the body's needs.

CONTINUITY THEORY

A more formal elaboration of activity theory; uses a life course perspective to define normal aging and to distinguish it from pathological aging.

COPING

A state of compatibility between the individual and the environment so that the individual maintains a sense of well-being or satisfaction with quality of life.

CORONARY BYPASS SURGERY

A procedure to reduce blockage of the blood vessels supplying the heart.

COUNTERTRANSITIONS

Life course transitions produced by the role changes of others.

CREATIVITY

A measure of divergent thinking; the production of alternative solutions to a problem or situation; most elusive mental process to define and measure.

CRITICAL GERONTOLOGY

An approach that emphasizes how the forces of globalization affect policies and programs for the aged and the daily lives of older people.

CROSS-LINKAGE THEORY OF AGING

A theory of biological aging; states that the accumlation of cross-linked collagen is responsible for many changes associated with aging such as the loss of elasticity of the skin, hardening of the arteries of the circulatory system, and stiffness of joints throughout the body.

CROSS-SECTIONAL RESEARCH

Research comparing people of differnt cohorts at a single point in time.

CROWDED NEST

The trend of young adults returning to the parental home.

CRYSTALLIZED INTELLIGENCE

Intelligence based on the information, skills, and strategies that people have learned through experience; reflects accumulated past experience and socialization.

DEFERRED EXCHANGE STRATEGIES

Exchanges between individuals over the life course.

DEMENTIA

A form of mental illness that mainly occurs in old age.

DEMOGRAPHIC TRANSITION

The shift from high mortality and fertility to low mortality and fertilty that causes population aging; occurs in three stages.

DEMOGRPAHY

The study of the basic population processes of fertilty, mortality, and migration.

DISENGAGEMENT THEORY

The first formal theory of aging; the view that normal aging involves a natural and inevitable mutual withdrawel or disengagement, resulting in decreasing interaction between an aged person and others.

EARLY ADULTHOOD

One of Levinson's developmental periods of adulthood; ages 17 to 45.

EARLY ADULT TRANSITION

One of Levinson's developmental stages; the era when childhood draws to a close; the developmental tasks are to begin forming an adult identity and to separate from one's family of origin.

ECHO BOOMERS

The generation of Americans born between 1977 and 1994.

ELDERLY DEPENDENCY RATIO

The number of persons aged 65 or older per 100 persons of working age.

EMPTY NEST

Period when a couple is alone together following the departure of children from the home.

ENCODING

A stage of memory whe information that is learned is stored for later use.

ERECTILE DYSFUNCTION

The inability to maintain an erection sufficient for penettration or sexual intercourse.

EXCHANGE THEORY

A theory that social interaction between individuals is based on rational calculations and that people seek to maximize their rewards from these exchanges and minimize their costs; exchange theorists argue that interaction between the old and the young decreases, because older people have fewer resources to bring to the exchange.

EXPANSIVE WOMEN

One of Apter's types of midlife women; these women sought fundamental change in their lives in midlife.

EYE BLINK CLASSICAL CONDITIONING

(EBCC)

The reflex that makes an individual blink when air is blown into the eye.

FEMINIST THEORY

The central purpose is to illuminate the gendered nature of society; gender relations are the main subject matter; notions of masculinity and femininity are seen as socially constructed; emphasis is on the different ways aging is experienced by men and women.

FERTILITY RATE

A measure of the incidence of births or the inflow of new lives into a population.

FLUID INTELLIGENCE

Refers to the reasoning memory, and information-processing skills; involves the ability to devise novel solutions to unforeseen problems; required to identfy relationships and to draw inferences on the basis of that understanding.

FRAIL ELDERLY

Older people who depend on others for carrying out their daily activites; they show some mental or physical deterioration and need care from family members.

FREE RADICAL THEORY ON AGING

A theory of biological aging; the view that free radicals contribute to the aging process by forming age pigment and by producing cross-links.

FUNCTIONAL AGE

A definition of age based on how people look and what they can do; functional terms, a person becomes old when he or she can no longer perform the major roles of adulthood.

GENERATION

A term applied to studies of family process; refers to kinship links.

GENETIC CONTROL THEORY OF AGING

A theory of biological aging; the view that the life span is programmed into the genes.

GERONTOLOGY

The scientific study of the biological, psychological, and social aspects of aging.

GLAUCOMA

A serious condition that can lead to blindness; occurs when fluid cannot leave the anterior cavitity of the eye through the normal channels; pressure builds up within the eye, gradually destroying vision.

HORMONE REPLACEMENT THERAPY

(HRT)

A treatment to eliminate the physical symptoms of menopause and to provide protection against heart disease and osteoporosis.

HYPERTENSION

High Blood Pressure

HYPERTENSIVE CARDIOVASCULAR DISEASE

Hypertension leading to a heart attack.

IMMEDIATE EXCHANGE STRATEGIES

Exchanges between individuals in goods and services at one point in time.

IMMUNE FUNCTION THEORY OF AGING

A biological theory of aging based on two discoveries: (1) protective immune reactions decline with age, with the body becoming less capable of producing sufficient quantities and kinds of antibodies, and (2) the aging immune system mistakenly produces antibodies against normal body proteins, leading to a loss of self- recognition; as the immune system becomes less efficient normal aging occurs.

INNOVATIVE WOMEN

One of Apter's types of midlife women; women who were pioneers in a men's world.

INTELLIGENCE

A measure of intellectual ability.

KANSAS CITY STUDY OF ADULT LIFE

A series of studies designed to identify how people adjusted to normal aging processes; the studies coupled on emphasis on adjustment with measures of social role performance across the life span.

LEARNING

The process of acquiring knowledge and skills.

LENTIGO

The discoloration or spotting that commonly appears on the face, back of hands, and forearms of people 50 or older.

LIFE COURSE

The interaction between historical events, personal decisions, and individual opportunities; experiences early in life effect subsequent outcomes.

LIFE EXPECTANCY

The average number of years people in a given population can expect to live; the mean age of death; a measure of the combined outcome of many births and deaths calculated by taking the sum of the ages of death of all individuals in a given population and dividing it by the number of people in that population.

LIFE SPAN

The longest number of years any member of a species has been known to survive.

LONGITUDINAL RESEARCH

The process of sorting complex methodological issues involved in distinguishing between age effects, cohort effects, and period effects.

LONG-TERM MEMORY

The permanent storage site for past experiences; involves the ability to recall distant people and events; helps people make meaningful connections between the past and the present.

MELANOMA

Dangerous skin cancer, which can metastasize and send cancerous cells to other parts of the body.

MEMORY

The retention or storage of knowledge.

MENOPAUSE

The permanent cessation of the menstrual cycle.

MIDDLE ADULTHOOD

One of Levinson's developmental stages; lasts from age 40 to 65 following midlife transition.

MIDDLE-OLD

People aged 75 to 84.

MIDLIFE TRANSITION

One of Levinson's developmental stages; terminates the era of early adulthood.

MODERNIZATION THEORY

The view that nations can be placed on a continuum from least developed to most developed, according to such indicators as the level of industrialization or the degree of urbanization, with those exhibiting certain qualities of social structure termed modern; basic premise is that the aged were revered in the past and that modernization has caused the status of the aged to decline.

MORTALITY RATE

The incidence of death in a population.

MOTOR NERVES

They carry outgoing information from the central nervous system to muscles and glands throughout the body.

NEURONS

Brain cells that carry information throughout the body in the form of electrical signals.

OLDEST-OLD

People 85 or older.

OSTEOPOROSIS

Disease that causes the outside walls of the bone to become thinner and the inner part of the bone to become spongy; in the later stages, symptoms include a loss of height, back pain, and a curving of the upper back or spine, sometimes called a dowager's hump when spinal bones weaken and slowly collapse under the weight of the upper bones.