Suggested Readings
Butler, R. N., The Longevity Revolution: The Benefits and Challenges of Living a Long Life, New York: PublicAffairs, 2008.
Friedman, H. S., and Martin, L. R., The Longevity Project: Surprising Discoveries for Health and Long Life from the Landmark Eight-Decade Study, London: Hudson Street Press, 2011.
Irving, P., The Upside of Aging: How Long Life Is Changing the World of Health, Work, Innovation, Policy and Purpose, New York: Wiley, 2014.
Kirkwood, T., Time of Our Lives: The Science of Human Aging, New York: Oxford, 2001.
Olshansky, S. J., Kirkland, J., and Martin, G. (Eds.), Aging: The Longevity Dividend, Cold Spring Harbor, NY: Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press, 2015.
Silvertown, J., The Long and the Short of It: The Science of Life Span and Aging, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2013.
Controversy 1 Does Old Age Have Meaning?
The Meaning of Age
Most of the characteristic qualities we associate with old age are uniquely human. For instance, among animal species in the wild, we never see offspring take care of the aging parents who gave birth to them. On the contrary, young animals typically leave their parents when they themselves reach maturity, like baby birds that leave the nest to fly on their own. It is only human beings who care for and honor the oldest members of the species, just as only human beings care for and remember their dead. In both cases, we might ask: Why?
The answer is that human beings live in a symbolic world of shared meaning, and the power of meaning can be a matter of life and death. For example, acts of bravery in crisis or wartime prove that people are willing to sacrifice their lives for what outlives the individual self—whether they act on behalf of family, religion, patriotism, or something else. Outliving the self—what Erik Erikson called generativity—is not limited to acts of sacrifice (Kotre, 1984). Awareness of a meaning that transcends individual life is a universal human quality. Transcendence and the search for meaning are what make us human (Frankl, 2006).
Human beings contemplate aging and death, and they reach backward and forward in time to pose questions about the meaning of existence. In remembering the dead and in caring for the aged, we express our deepest convictions about the meaning of life. Old age is a time when we are likely to come face-to-face with questions about the ultimate meaning of being human. While there have always been some members of any given population that are the oldest, it was only in the 20th century that a sizable proportion of the population survived to experience old age. It is therefore natural that, in our time, the meaning of old age has become an issue.
The question about whether old age has meaning is both a personal question and a challenge for gerontology. The personal question is ultimately a matter of values: What is it that makes my life worth living into the last stage? Put this way, it may seem like an abstract or philosophical question. But as we see in discussions about end-of-life decisions, this question becomes practical for families, health professionals, and, in truth, everyone.
Whether old age has meaning is central to what we understand to be life satisfaction or morale in old age (Ardelt & Edwards, 2015; Kaufman, 1986). If aging threatens deeply held values—such as the desire to be independent, to have control, or to be socially esteemed—then both society and individuals will seek to avoid aging or deny it as much as possible. Aging and dying are not the same thing, of course, but they are strongly associated in the minds of many. The denial of aging and the denial of death are central problems for our society (Becker, 1973; Schillace, 2015).
Thus, there are at least three questions we need to examine: Does old age have a meaning for society? How do individuals actually experience their lives as meaningful in the last stage of life? And, for you, the reader of this book, how do you imagine your future older self, and what do you imagine will be meaningful to you? These questions are related, and all pose a challenge to gerontology. A key issue is whether we have a theory of aging that can explain the facts about old age, including the different meanings old age takes on over the course of life and through history. To focus on these questions about meaning and aging, we can begin with two domains—leisure and religion—that express contrasting values of activity and disengagement and thereby offer alternative perspectives on how people find meaning in later life.
Leisure Activities in Later Life
Old age is characteristically a time when the work role becomes less constricting. Leisure may take its place as a way of finding meaning in life. We might think of leisure simply as discretionary time, which becomes more available during the retirement years. But more deeply, leisure can be defined as activity engaged in for its own sake, as an end in itself. Leisure is not simply what we do with “leftover” time, but a multidimensional quality of life different from paid employment, household maintenance, or other instrumental activities. Aristotle described leisure as a realm in which human beings gain freedom for self-development when the necessities of life have been taken care of.
Does leisure actually replace the work role in later life? Does it become a powerful source of meaning in its own right? The answer to these questions depends on the quality of subjective experience during leisure. Leisure may be an end in itself, but moments of leisure also have a developmental structure; they are not complete in themselves. For example, if we play sports, perform music, participate in political or civic activities, or read a book, each moment leads to the next in some purposeful developmental pattern. By contrast, other common leisure activities, such as TV viewing, take up a lot of time for older people, but tend to be passive or less demanding. If leisure activity is to be a path to deeper meaning, then it must have some dimension of growth or personal development (McGuire, Boyd, & Tedrick, 2004; Bielak, 2017).
As people get older, they usually engage in the same activities as earlier in life, but with advancing age, there tends to be an overall decline in the level of participation. It is a mistake to think in stereotypes about “old people’s” activities, such as shuffleboard, bingo, and singing old-time songs. That stereotype is wrong because age alone does not serve as a good predictor of what people do with their leisure in later life. Old people are not all alike. Variations and individual differences, along with the influence of gender, cultural background, education level, socioeconomic status, and other factors, play a big part.
Changing Leisure Participation Patterns
How do patterns of leisure activity change over the life course? Broadly speaking, people ages 65 and older continue to engage in the same activities with the same people as they did in middle age. Although there is some selective age-related withdrawal, active engagement remains a key to life satisfaction and positive meaning in later life. In addition, participation in intellectual and political leisure activities may have protective benefits for cognition during later life (Kareholt et al., 2010).
Leisure is not simply what we do with “leftover” time, but a multidimensional quality of life.
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Social structures, not age itself, determine the uses of time in later life. According to surveys of time use, as people age, they spend varying proportions of time in paid work, family care, personal care, and free time. Most of the variation comes from a decrease in time spent working, not from any demonstrable effects of aging. People who are still in the labor force after age 65 have time use patterns similar to those of younger people. Retirement frees up time—findings from the 2018 American Time Use Survey indicate that people 75 years of age and older engage on average in 7.8 hours of leisure time daily, more than any other age group (Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2019a). After taking into account household labor, most of this gain in time is taken up by watching TV, reading, relaxing and thinking, and socializing. Some leisure activities decline with age, but others remain the same. A study of leisure found that