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Development
Through the Lifespan
Chapter 17
Physical and Cognitive
Development in
Late Adulthood
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Copyright © Allyn & Bacon 2007
Functional Age
 Actual competence
and performance
 May not match
chronological age
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Life Expectancy
 Increasing in North America
 Lower infant mortality
 Lower adult deaths
 Group differences
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Women live longer
SES
Ethnicity
Nationality
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Life Expectancy Crossover
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Quality of Life
 Activities of Daily Living (ADLs)
 Basic self-care tasks
 Bathing, dressing, eating
 Instrumental Activities of Daily
Living (IADLs)
 Conducting business of everyday life
 Require cognitive competence
 Shopping, food prep, housekeeping
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Factors in a Long Life
 Heredity
 Environment/Lifestyle
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Healthy diet, normal weight
Exercise
Low substance use
Optimism
Low stress
Social support
Community involvement
Learning
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Aging and the Nervous System
 Loss of brain weight accelerates after 60
 Neurons lost in frontal lobes, corpus callosum,
cerebellum (balance), glial cells
 Autonomic nervous system less efficient
 Brain can compensate
 New fibers, neurons
 New connections
 Use more parts of brain
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Visual Impairments and Aging
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Lower visual acuity
Poor dark adaptation, sensitivity to glare
Decreased color, depth perception
Cataracts
Macular degeneration
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Aging and
Visual and Hearing Impairments
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Effects of Sensory Changes
Vision
problems
Hearing loss
 Changes in leisure activities
 Possible problems in daily
activities
 Social isolation
 Lower safety and enjoyment
Decreased taste
 Nutritional, safety risks
and smell
Less sensitive
 Difficulties with leisure, daily
touch
activities
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Aging Systems of the Body
 Cardiovascular/Respiratory
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Heartbeat less forceful; slower heart rate, blood flow
Vital lung capacity cut by half
Less oxygen to tissues
Exercise helps
 Immune
 Effectiveness declines
 More infectious,
autoimmune diseases
 Stress-related susceptibility
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Sleep and Aging
 Need less sleep
 Earlier bedtime and wake-up
 More difficulties
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Insomnia
Nighttime waking
Sleep apnea
Restless legs
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Physical Appearance
and Mobility
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Skin thinner, rougher wrinkled, spotted
Ears, nose, teeth, and hair change
Lose height and weight after 60
Muscle strength declines
 10–20% by 60–70
 30–50% by 70–80
 Bone strength drops
 Less flexibility
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Adapting to
Physical Changes of Aging
 Multidimensional
 Appearance versus functioning
 Effective coping strategies
 Prevention, compensation
 Problem-centered coping
 Assistive technology
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Stereotypes of Aging
 Many assume deterioration is inevitable
 Elders experience prejudice, discrimination
 Assumptions affected by culture
 Stereotype threat
 Fear of confirming stereotype
reduces functioning
 May be changing
 Positive media portrayals
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Aging and Perceptions of Health
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Factors in Good Health
and Aging
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Optimism
Self-efficacy
SES
Ethnicity
Sex
Nutrition
Exercise
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Nutrition in Late Adulthood
 Need extra nutrients
 Protect bones, immune system
 Fight free radicals
 Problems eating
 Appetite, taste changes
 Chewing, digestion
 Shopping, cooking
 Supplements, diet changes
may help
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Exercise in Late Adulthood
 Continued exercise best, but never too late
to start
 Benefits
 Physical capacities
 Brain function
 Self-esteem
 Barriers
 Unaware of benefits
 Discomforts
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Sexuality in Late Adulthood
 Still important
 Less desire and frequency; fewer male partners for women
 Married couples: regular, enjoyable sex
 Continue patterns from earlier years
 Enjoy activities other than
intercourse
 Men sometimes stop all activities
if erection problems
 Cultural influences
 Disapproval in West
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Primary and Secondary Aging
Primary
Secondary
 Genetically influenced
declines
 Affects all members of
species
 Even happens if health
is good
 Declines due to heredity
and environment
 Effects individualized
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 Major contributor to frailty
 Illnesses and disabilities
 Arthritis
 Diabetes
 Mental disabilities
Arthritis
Osteoarthritis
Rheumatoid Arthritis
 Deteriorating cartilage
in frequently used
joints
 Common, related to
wear and tear
 Autoimmune response,
affects whole body
 Inflamed connective
tissues
 Membranes in joints
 Cartilage grows
 Can deform joints
 Lost mobility
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Adult-Onset Diabetes
 Too little insulin or cells insensitive to insulin
 Increases in late adulthood
 Genetics
 Inactivity, abdominal fat
 Risk of long-term damage
 Circulatory system
 Eyes, kidneys, nerves
 Treatment
 Lifestyle changes
 Medicine
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Accidents in Late Adulthood
 Motor vehicle
 Vision problems, slower reactions
 Falls
 Vision, balance, strength problems
 Risk of hip fracture
 Prevention
 Reduce driving, retrain
 Exercise, use walking aids
 Redesign of cars, streets, signs, structures
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Mental Disabilities
in Late Adulthood
Dementia - thought and behavior impairments that
disrupt everyday life
 Parkinson’s disease
 Alzheimer’s disease
 Cerebrovascular dementia
 Strokes
 Misdiagnosis, reversible dementia
 Depression
 Medication side effects
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Alzheimer’s Disease
Incidence
 Higher with age - nearly 50% over 80
Forgetting, disorientation, personality change,
Symptoms depression, motor problems, delusions,
speech problems, infections
Brain
Neurofibrillary tangles, amyloid plaques in
Changes cerebral cortex
Risk
 Genetic predispositions
Factors/  High-fat diet - Mediterranean diet may help
Protective Education, active lifestyle may help
Factors
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Help for Caregivers
of Elders with Dementia
 Knowledge
 About the diseases, available resources
 Coping Strategies
 Caregiving Skills
 Respite
 At least twice a week
 Video Respite
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Long-Term Care in Late
Adulthood
 More with advanced age
 Severe disorders
 Loss of support network
 Varies by SES, ethnic group
 Alternatives
 Home care by family
 Publicly-funded help
 Home care professionals
 Assisted living
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Increasing Nursing Home Care
with Age
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Selective Optimization
with Compensation
 Select
 Choose personally valued
activities, avoid others
 Optimize
 Devote diminishing resources
to valued activities
 Compensate
 Find creative ways to
overcome limitations
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Deliberate versus Automatic
Memory
Deliberate
 Recall more difficult
 Context helps retrieval,
but slower processing,
smaller working
memory make context
harder to encode
Automatic
 Recognition easier
than recall
 More environmental
support
 Implicit memory
better than deliberate
 Without conscious
awareness
 Depends on familiarity
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Associative Memory Declines
in Late Adulthood
 Difficulty in creating
or retrieving links
between pieces of
information
 Using memory cues,
enhancing
meaningfulness of
information, can help
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Remote and Prospective Memory
Remote
 Very long-term
recall
 Autobiographical
memory
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Prospective
 Remembering to
engage in planned
actions
 Event-based easier
than time-based
 Use reminders,
repetition to help
Aging and
Autobiographical Memories
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Language Processing
in Late Adulthood
 Comprehension changes very little
 Problems retrieving specific words
 Tip-of-the-tongue
 Use more pronouns, pauses in speech
 Problems planning what to say
 Hesitations, false starts, repetition,
sentence fragments
 Statements less organized
 Compensation
 Simpler grammar, more sentences, gist
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Problem Solving
in Late Adulthood
 Real problems include family relations, IADLs
 Extend strategies from middle adulthood
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Avoid uncontrollable problems
Use experience to decide quickly when can
Consult others
Collaborate
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Wisdom
 Depth and breadth of practical knowledge
 Reflect on knowledge
 Apply knowledge
to improve life
 Listening and evaluating
 Advice
 Altruistic creativity
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Who is Wise?
 Life experience
 Age is no guarantee
 Combined with life experience, it helps
 Human service training, practice
 Overcoming adversity
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Factors Related to
Cognitive Change
 Mentally active life
 Education, stimulating leisure,
social participation, flexibility
 Health
 Retirement
 Distance to death
 Terminal decline
 Cognitive interventions
 ADEPT, ACTIVE
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Lifelong Learning
 Educational participation increasing
 Elderhostel
 College courses
 Community classes
 Many benefits
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New facts, ideas
New friends
Broader world perspective
Improved self-image
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