Modernization has made it possible for people to live a greater portion of their lives in old age than ever before in history. At the same time, the distinctive stance of postmodern culture tends to preclude finding any special meaning or purpose for the last stage of life. Whether modernization has reduced the power of the old seems debatable. Public spending for old-age benefits suggests that just the opposite may be true. But there is no doubt that modernization has helped to erode traditional ideas about fixed stages of life that were once based on shared meaning (Gruman, 1978). The result is a sense of openness or uncertainty about the meaning of old age. Such openness to new ideas and to contradictory answers is disconcerting to some and exhilarating to others. However, the future of an aging society will be shaped by all of us because, in the end, the old are simply our future selves.
Focus on Practice
Reminiscence and Life Review
As people grow older, it is not unusual for them to reminisce about the “good old days.” Feelings of both nostalgia and regret are commonly part of this attitude toward the past. A stereotypical response to reminiscence is to assume that older people are interested only in the past or, still worse, to see those who dwell on past memories as showing signs of escapism or even mental impairment. But late-life reminiscence may be a normal form of life review, which Robert Butler (1963) defined as a natural, even universal process stimulated by awareness of approaching death. He also wrote:
The life review is characterized by a progressive return to consciousness of past experience, in particular the resurgence of unresolved conflicts which can now be surveyed and integrated…. If unresolved conflicts and fears are successfully reintegrated they can give new significance and meaning to an individual’s life. (Butler, 1974, p. 534)
Butler’s view is similar to that of Erik Erikson, who sees the psychological task of late life as achieving ego integrity, a reintegration of all aspects of the individual’s life. Both Erikson and Butler based their psychological theories on the importance of finding meaning in the last stage of life. But do the facts support their theories? Just how important is reminiscence in old age?
Some studies have shown that older adults actually do not spend much more time daydreaming about the past than do people of other ages (Gambria, 1977), so it may be a mistake to see life review as a universal process. However, regardless of frequency, reminiscence may have adaptive value; that is, it may promote better mental health in old age. One early study of reminiscence found that people who spend time thinking about the past are less likely to suffer depression (McMahon & Rhudick, 1967). Some psychologists who have studied life review feel it may be a psychological defense mechanism that helps some people adjust to memories of an unhappy past. In that sense, reminiscence could be described as an adaptive feature of old age (Coleman, 1974), which is something to be encouraged (Brennan & Steinberg, 1983–1984).
Reminiscence and life review appear to help some older people bolster their self-image. By recalling the past, older adults can improve self-esteem and establish solidarity with others of their own generation. We might interpret older people’s interaction with the young as a way to help them maximize perceived power or status, just as the exchange theory of aging predicts. When activity is the preferred style, older people are likely to downplay reminiscence in favor of talking about present or future events. But when disengagement is the preferred style, older people may emphasize past accomplishments.
Some gerontologists recommend that reminiscence and life review can have great value for older people who can no longer remain active (Haight & Haight, 2007). For that reason, reminiscence groups have been encouraged as a form of therapy among some nursing home residents and senior center participants. Guided autobiography is a method used as a basis for education in the later years (Birren & Cochran, 2001). Spiritual autobiography groups have played a similar role in religious congregations.
All these methods can be useful for practitioners who work with older people, but techniques to encourage reminiscence as a form of practice must not divert us from a basic question: Is reminiscence or life review the best way of achieving a sense of meaning in old age? The response to that question cannot be purely scientific, but depends on basic values and philosophy of life. For example, if we follow philosopher Simone de Beauvoir’s view, then activity and future orientation are the best approaches to finding meaning in old age. She would therefore discourage people from spending time reminiscing about the past, unless past memories can somehow contribute to improving the world. Psychologist Carl Jung, in contrast, would see great value in inwardness or interiority in old age. The purpose or meaning of old age, in his view, is not necessarily to be active, but to know ourselves better and to accept ourselves as individuals (Sawin, Corbett, & Carbine, 2014). If life review can promote that goal, then Jung would encourage it, and Florida Scott-Maxwell, for example, follows along the lines suggested by Jung.
Do the reminiscence and life review by older people have meaning for people of other ages? Clearly, there is something special about old age precisely because it is the final stage of life. The last stage includes an awareness of finitude and a shortened time perspective (Kastenbaum, 1983). Furthermore, as the pace of social change increases, older people can no longer take for granted that their values will be shared by other cohorts; the 1960s and World War II generations may be quite different, not only from one another but from Generation X, born during the baby bust after the mid-1960s. The old may be perceived by others or perceive themselves as belonging to “the past,” regardless of their own subjective time orientation. Young people may assume that reminiscence is something appropriate only for the old.
In fact, the process of life review or autobiographical consciousness is not limited to old age, but occurs at transitions across the adult life course—for instance, in self-assessment after a job loss or another major life change. The life course perspective helps us appreciate links between subjective and objective time orientations and to see life review in broader terms. The search for meaning in life occurs not only at the end of life, but every time human beings become aware of their limited time on earth. It is perhaps for that reason that in the Bible the Psalms include a prayer for God to help us all “number our days” and thus cherish each passing moment, whatever our age may be.
Reading 1: The Coming of Age
Simone de Beauvoir
Die early or grow old: there is no other alternative. And yet, as Goethe said, “Age takes hold of us by surprise.” For himself each man is the sole, unique subject, and we are often astonished when the common fate becomes our own—when we are struck by sickness, a shattered relationship, or bereavement. I remember my own stupefaction when I was seriously ill for the first time in my life and I said to myself, “This woman they are carrying on a stretcher is me.” Nevertheless, we accept fortuitous accidents readily enough, making them part of our history, because they affect us as unique beings: but old age is the general fate, and when it seizes upon our own personal life we are dumbfounded. “Why, what has happened?” writes Aragon. “It is life that has happened, and I am old.” … When we are grown up we hardly think about our age anymore: we feel that the notion does not apply to us; for it is one which assumes that we look back towards the past and draw a line under the total, whereas in fact we are reaching out towards the future, gliding on imperceptibly from day to day, from year to year. Old age is particularly difficult to assume because we have always regarded it as something alien, a foreign species: “Can I have become a different being while I still remain myself?” …
Thus, the very quality of the future changes between middle age and the end of one’s life. At sixty-five one is not merely twenty years older than one was at forty-five. One has exchanged an indefinite future—and one had a tendency to look upon it as infinite—for a finite future. In earlier days, we could see no boundary mark upon the horizon: now we do see one. “When I used to dream in former times,” says Chateaubriand, harking back to his remote past, “my youth lay before me; I could advance towards the unknown that I was looking