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16Prenatal Development And

Birth Social and Personality Development in Middle Adulthood

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Copyright © Allyn & Bacon 2006

Theories of Social and Personality Development

• Erikson’s Generativity versus Stagnation– Generativity

• Involves an interest in establishing and guiding the next generation

– Bearing children, teaching, serving as a mentor, taking a leadership role in civic, religious or charitable organizations

– Stagnation• Failure leads to a pervading sense of stagnation

and personal impoverishment; they indulge themselves as if they were their own child.


Erikson’s Theory

• The impact of childlessness– The way a man had responded earlier to his

childlessness was predictive of his psychological health at age 47.

– Suggests that rearing one’s own or another’s child who calls forth one’s nurturing qualities may be important for psychological growth.


Mid-Life Crisis: Fact or Fiction?

• Levinson and Erikson argue for a crisis

– Each person must confront a constellation of difficult tasks at mid-life

• Accepting one’s own mortality• Recognizing new physical limitations and health

risks• Adapting to major changes in most roles


Mid-Life Crisis: Fact or Fiction?

• Research offers diametrically opposite conclusions– Serious mid-life problems are experienced by only 2% to 5% of

middle agers (Chiriboga).

– Mid-life is an important psychological transition marked with deep-seated self-doubts or confusion (Tamir).

– Using a mid-life crisis scale, researchers could find no age at which scores were significantly high.

– Longitudinal research fails to support the idea of midlife crisis.


Role Transitions

• Roles are at least partially culture and cohort specific.

• Each of us must occupy multiple roles at the same time, which produces frictions of various kinds.

• Role Conflict – any situation in which two or more roles are at least partially incompatible

• Role Strain – stress that occurs when a person lacks the resources needed to fulfill a role

• Certain roles shift predictably with age.


Role Transitions

• Duvall described a sequence of 8 family life stages.

• Because an individual’s behaviors and attitudes are shaped by their roles, role change with age will lead to systematic and predictable change in the individual.

• Model omits a number of important roles.

• Model does not reflect the years beyond 65.

• People don’t move through the sequence in the listed order.


Role Transitions

• Sociologists suggest that changes in status and bounded in duration should be thought of as life course markers.

– Markers for early adulthood have been found to be more unpredictable than in the past.

– Markers in middle and late adulthood have become more predictable.

– Dealing with some sequence of roles is part of adult life.


Changes in Relationships

• Partnerships– Marital stability and satisfaction increase in

mid-life.• Conflicts over child-rearing decline• Increased sense of control• Identification of successful problem-solving

strategies• Use of skilled diplomacy to ease tensions


Children and Parents

• In middle adulthood the family role involves giving assistance in both directions of the generational chain.– Helping grown children– Supporting aging parents

• Must shoulder responsibility for maintaining affectional bonds

• Between 40 and 65, adults give help more than they receive in both directions within the family


Children and Parents

• Gunhild Hagestad– Middle-aged adults spent more effort trying to influence their

children than their parents.

– Young adult children receive advice aimed at shaping children’s transition to key adult roles.

– Aging parents receive advice on where to live, and how to manage household and money.

– Inter-generational discussions tended to have a particular theme and agenda.


Emptying the Nest

• When women are asked about positive and negative transitions in their lives, they are more likely to describe this event as positive.

• A significant portion of women report that the transition involved a distinct mellowing and an increase in marital satisfaction.

• Those who do experience some distress appear to have a self-identity that is heavily focused on the role of mother.


Grandparenting

• New roles for middle-aged adults– Becoming in-laws as children marry– Becoming grandparents

• Grandparenting may shift to a slightly later age.

• Most grandparents express high levels of satisfaction with this role.

• Grandparents can have a positive impact on children’s development.– Especially important source of stability for children of divorced

parents


Grandparenting

• 29% of grandparents had remote relationships

• Saw grandkids infrequently

• Little direct influence on their development

• Most common reason was physical distance


Grandparenting

• 51% of grandparents report having a companionate relationship.– Warm, pleasurable relationships– Glad they no longer had day-to-day responsibilities

• 16% reported involved relationships.– Everyday participants in the rearing of their grandchildren– Living in multi-generational housing– Nearly full-time care– Most common in African American families– More common in poor families


Grandparenting

• Full-time custodial grandparenting is more likely with an unmarried mother.– Daughter can continue school or work.– Teenage mothers who have such help complete more schooling

and have more successful careers.

• Role of grandmother is broader and more intimate than that of grandfather.

• For most adults in middle age, grandparenthood is not central to their lives, their sense of self, or to their overall morale.


Questions to Ponder

• Which kind of relationship do you have with your grandparents? What kinds of influence do they try to exert upon your life?

• From your viewpoint, do people go through a mid-life crisis? Are they major events or minor adjustments? Please give examples.


Caring For Aging Parents

• Adults feel a strong sense of filial responsibility – when parents need help, children try to provide it.

• 18% of elderly live with their children.

• Only 11% of adults between 40 and 65 were providing as much as 3 hours per week of assistance to an older parent.


Caring For Aging Parents

• Longitudinal research suggests that 40% of women will provide at least minimal caregiving to elders in their lifetimes.

– 25% will provide significant care to parents or parents-in-law.

– 90% of caregivers for those with Alzheimer’s disease are daughters or daughters-in-law.

• The intense nature of this type of care is associated with negative health and depression for the caregiver.


Friends

• Total number of friends is less in middle adulthood than at earlier points.

– Friendships are more intimate and close at this age.

– The number of shared friends increases as the number of non-shared friends decreases.

– Friendships endure, even with less frequent contact.


Continuity and Change in Personality

• Negative emotional traits in adolescence strongly predicted less-than-optimal mental health status in both early adulthood and middle age.

• Most people believe personality changes with age.

– Declines in achievement striving, independence, assertiveness, and individualism

– Increases in prosocial behaviors

– Increases in ability to maintain control over emotions

– Growth of personal flexibility


Mid-Life Career Issues

• Work satisfaction is at its peak despite few work promotions in middle age.– For men, the issue of work is less central to their lives.

• The quality of work performance remains high in spite of declines in some cognitive or physical skills.

• When work provides a greater sense of control and social-cognitive skills are good, work satisfaction remains high.


Mid-life Career Issues

• Work Satisfaction for Middle-Age Women– More complex than men

– Empty nest does not mean return to work• Exceptions – divorce or widowhood

– Satisfaction tied to how they view the career decisions made in early adulthood


Job Performance

• Remains high throughout middle adulthood– Exceptions are jobs that require speedy reactions or

physical strength

• Baltes and Baltes argue that adults engage in selective optimization with compensation to remain highly productive.

• Link between selection, optimization, and compensation and the quality of work performance got stronger with increasing age.


Unemployment and Career Transitions

• Can be more difficult in middle age– Must overcome ageism in obtaining new

employment

• Involuntary career changers– Experience heightened levels of anxiety and

depression and health risks after job loss• Financial pressures• Changes in family relationships• Loss of self-esteem



• African American adults show higher rates of distress and lower levels of life satisfaction when unemployed.– Unemployment rate is typically twice that of white

workers

– Vulnerable to job loss with less education, less portable skills, less job seniority

– A sense of victimization occurs, with increased ill health and depression



• Mid-life career changers who have good coping skills are less likely to become depressed.

• Adequate social support acts as a buffer.

• Formulating goals and obtaining training to buffer future transitions helps avoid mental health issues.


Voluntary Career Changers

• Twin studies suggest a genetic basis for voluntary career changes in mid-life.

• Studies suggest voluntary changes are a product of personality. – Better sense of control

– Higher tolerance for risk-taking

– Not stressed by job-seeking

– Not willing to pursue further career advancement in current field


Preparing for Retirement

• Boomers are projected to be the healthiest, best educated, and longest-living retirees in history.

• Baby Boom cohorts who are now middle-aged make retirement plans for both wives and husbands.– Expect to retire in early 60’s and live into the 80’s

– Believe they need higher retirement incomes than parents

– Do not expect Social Security to help their standard of living

– May not have saved enough and have accumulated too much debt

http://www.ablongman.com/bee4e Copyright © Allyn & Bacon 2006

16Prenatal Development And

Birth End Show

This multimedia product and its contents are protected under copyright law. The following are prohibited by law:• any public performance or display, including transmission of any image over a network;• preparation of any derivative work, including the extraction, in whole or part, of any images;• any rental, lease, or lending of the program.

Http:// © Allyn & Bacon 2006 16 Prenatal Development And Birth Social and Personality Development...

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