Development
th
13 Life-Span Edition
Chapter16:
SocioemotionalDevelopmentinMiddle
Adulthood
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STAGES OF ADULTHOOD
Eriksons Generativity vs. Stagnation:
Generativity: adults desire to leave legacies of
themselves to the next generation
Biological generativity
Parental generativity
Work generativity
Cultural generativity
Stagnation: develops when individuals sense that
they have done nothing for the next generation
Research supports Eriksons theory
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STAGES OF ADULTHOOD
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STAGES OF ADULTHOOD
Levinsons Seasons of a Mans Life:
20s are a novice phase of adult development
Exploring the possibilities for adult living; developing a
stable life structure
30s are a time for focusing on family and career
development
Becoming Ones Own Man (BOOM)
By the 40s, man has a stable career and now must
look forward to the kind of life he will lead as a
middle-aged adult
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STAGES OF ADULTHOOD
Levinsons Seasons of a Mans Life (continued):
Transition to middle adulthood lasts about 5 years (ages 40
to 45) and requires that men come to grips with conflicts
existing since adolescence:
Being young vs. being old
Being destructive vs. being constructive
Being masculine vs. being feminine
Being attached to others vs. being separated from them
According to Levinson, 70%80% of men find the midlife
transition tumultuous and psychologically painful
A successful transition rests on reducing the polarities and
accepting each as an integral part of ones being
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LEVINSONS PERIODS OF ADULT
DEVELOPMENT
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STAGES OF ADULTHOOD
How pervasive are midlife crises?
Vaillants Grant Study:
The 40s are a decade of reassessing and recording the
truth about the adolescent and adult years
Only a minority of adults experience a midlife crisis
Reports of general well-being and life satisfaction tend to
be high during mid-life
Another study found that 26% of adults
experienced a midlife crisis
Most attributed this to negative life events rather than
aging
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STAGES OF ADULTHOOD
Adults often experience a peak of personal control and
power during middle age
Adults ability to master their environment, autonomy,
and personal relations improve during middle age
Adult developmental experts generally agree that
midlife crises have been exaggerated
In general, stage theories place too much emphasis on
crises in development
There is often considerable individual variation in the way
people experience the stages
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STAGES OF ADULTHOOD
Individual Variations:
Stage theories do not adequately address individual
variations in adult development
Some individuals may experience a midlife crisis
in some contexts of their lives but not others
In 1/3 of cases where individuals report
experiencing a midlife crisis, the crisis was
triggered by life events such as job loss, financial
problems, or illness
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THE LIFE-EVENTS APPROACH
The life-events approach is another major way to
conceptualize adult personality development
Contemporary Life-Events Approach: how life
events influence the individuals development depends
on:
The life event itself
Mediating factors
The individuals adaptation to the life event
Life-stage context
Sociohistorical context
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THE LIFE-EVENTS APPROACH
Drawbacks:
Life-events approach places too much emphasis on
change, not adequately recognizing stability
It may not be lifes major events that are the
primary sources of stress, but our daily experiences
Focus on daily hassles and uplifts rather than major
events
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THE LIFE-EVENTS APPROACH
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STRESS AND PERSONAL
CONTROL
Overall, stress is highest in young and middleaged adults; declines in older adults
Middle-aged adults experience more overload
stressors that involve juggling too many activities at
once
Middle-aged adults are more reactive to interpersonal
stressors (but less reactive to work stressors) than
younger adults
On average, a sense of personal control
decreases as adults become older
Some aspects increase while others decrease
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STRESS AND PERSONAL
CONTROL
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CONTEXTS OF MIDLIFE
DEVELOPMENT
Historical Contexts (cohort effects):
Changing historical times and different social
expectations influence how cohorts move through the
life span
Social clock: the timetable according to which
individuals are expected to accomplish lifes tasks
Gender Contexts:
Most stage theories are accused of male bias
Womens concerns and stressors are different from
those of men
Cultural and social attitudes affect womens roles
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CONTEXTS OF MIDLIFE
DEVELOPMENT
Gender Contexts (continued):
Early fifties brought a new prime of life for many
women
More empty nests
Better health
Higher income
More concern for parents
Stereotype that midlife is a negative age period for
women is largely false
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CONTEXTS OF MIDLIFE
DEVELOPMENT
Cultural Contexts:
In many nonindustrialized societies, the concept of
middle age is unclear or absent
Midlife often brings about great change for women
in nonindustrialized societies:
Often freed from restrictions placed on younger women
Right to exercise authority over specified younger kin
Eligibility for special status and the possibility of
recognition beyond the household
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CONTEXTS OF MIDLIFE
DEVELOPMENT
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STABILITY AND CHANGE
The Baltimore Study the used big five factors of
personality to study 1,000 college-educated
persons aged 20 to 96 starting from the 1950s
and continuing today:
Considerable stability in the five personality factors
Agreeableness and conscientiousness increased in
early and middle adulthood
Neuroticism decreased in early adulthood
Openness to experience increased in adolescence/early
adulthood and then decreased in late adulthood
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STABILITY AND CHANGE
Berkeley Longitudinal Studies: more than 500
children and parents studied in the 1920s
through midlife:
No support that personality is characterized by
changes or stability from adolescence to midlife
Intellectual orientation, self-confidence, and
openness to experience were the more stable traits
Ability to nurture and self-control changed most
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STABILITY AND CHANGE
Helsons Mills College Study: studied 152
women from the 1950s through their 30s, 40s,
and 50s
Three main groups:
Family-oriented
Career-oriented
Neither path
Between age 27 and early 40s, women shifted toward
less traditional feminine attitudes
Midlife crisis was really midlife consciousness
Similarities in concerns found between women in early
their early 40s and Levinsons findings
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STABILITY AND CHANGE
Vaillants Studies: conducted three longitudinal
studies from the 1920s through today:
Alcohol abuse and smoking at age 50 was the best
predictor of death between ages 75 and 80
Factors at age 50 which are best predictors of
happy-well between ages 75 and 80:
Regular exercise and avoiding being overweight
Well-educated and future oriented
Having a stable marriage and good coping skills
Being thankful, forgiving, and empathetic
Being active with other people
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STABILITY AND CHANGE
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STABILITY AND CHANGE
Conclusions:
Evidence does not support the view that personality
traits become completely fixed at a certain age
Change is typically small and limited; stability peaks
in the 50s and 60s
Cumulative personality model: with time and age,
people become more adept at interacting with their
environment in ways that promote the stability of
personality
Some change still characterizes personality in middle
age and late adulthood
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STABILITY AND CHANGE
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LOVE AND MARRIAGE
Romantic love is typically strong in early adulthood
Affectionate love increases during middle adulthood
Most married individuals are satisfied with their
marriages during midlife
Divorce in midlife can be less intense due to increased
resources and lessened child-rearing responsibilities
However, emotional and time commitment to a long-lasting
marriage is typically not given up easily
Staying married because of the children is a common
reason for waiting to get a divorce
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THE EMPTY NEST
Empty Nest Syndrome: a decline in marital
satisfaction after the children leave the home
For most parents, marital satisfaction actually
increases during the years after child rearing
Refilling of empty nest is becoming a common
occurrence
Adult children are returning to live at home for
financial reasons
Loss of privacy is a common complaint for both
parents and adult children
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SIBLING RELATIONSHIPS AND
FRIENDSHIPS
Sibling relationships continue over the entire
life span
The majority of sibling relationships in adulthood
are close
Friendships continue to be important in
middle adulthood
Friendships that have endured over the adult years
tend to be deeper than those that have just been
formed in middle adulthood
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GRANDPARENTING
Many adults become grandparents during middle
age
Grandmothers have more contact with grandchildren
than grandfathers
Three prominent meanings:
Source of biological reward and continuity
Source of emotional self-fulfillment
Remote role
The grandparent role and its functions vary
among families, ethnic groups, and cultures
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GRANDPARENTING
Three Grandparenting Styles:
Fun-seeking style
Distant-figure style
Formal style
An increasing number of U.S. grandchildren live with
their grandparents
2.3 million in 1980; 6.1 million in 2005
Most common reasons are divorce, adolescent pregnancies,
and parental drug use
Tends to be more stressful for younger grandparents, when
grandchildren have physical and psychological problems,
and when there is low family cohesion
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GRANDPARENTING
Grandparents who take in grandchildren are
in better health, are better educated, are more
likely to be working outside the home, and
are younger than grandparents who move in
with their children
Concern over grandparent visitation of
children has become more common
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INTERGENERATIONAL
RELATIONSHIPS
Middle-aged and older adults typically express a
strong feeling of responsibility between
generations in their family
They share their experiences and transmit values to the
younger generation
Family members typically maintain considerable
contact across generations
When conflicts arise, parents most often cite
habits and lifestyle choices, while adult children
cite communication and interaction styles
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INTERGENERATIONAL
RELATIONSHIPS
Differences in gender:
Mothers and daughters have closer relationships
during their adult years than mothers and sons,
fathers and daughters, and fathers and sons
Married men are more involved with their wives
families than with their own
Maternal aunts and grandmothers are cited as the
most important or loved relative twice as often as
their paternal counterparts
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