Summary:
Chapter 17’s main topic of discussion is families in later life. The chapter starts out with our aging society in which life expectancy is brought up. Life expectancy is the average length of time people of the same age live. The beginning of the chapter discusses the growth of the older population, the gender gap, and growing racial and ethnic diversity. One of the common trends discussed was that the number of older Americans has increased, while the proportion of younger people has decreased. Also within this section some key concepts mention include, gerontologists, which are scientists who study the biological, psychological, and social aspects of aging, the young-old, which include people ages 65 to 74, the old-old, which include ages 75-84, and the oldest –old which include the age 85 and older. Each of these groups refer to those who live independently, working, and require health care. Another concept mentioned was old-age dependency ration, which is sometimes also called a dependency ration, an age dependency ration or support ratio. This chapter then continues to discuss health and ageism by covering topics such as when is it that a person is “old,” physical health, mental health, and ageism and stereotypes. The book states that based on factors such as personality, social status, and health will determine whether people feel middle-aged or old. Physical decline is normal and inevitable among people in all age groups including the late 30s. Also covered by the physical health section in this chapter is a discussion on how to live longer and better including things such as exercise physically, increasing the blood and oxygen flow to the brain, exercise mentally by playing things such as board games or doing crossword puzzles, lose weight and don’t smoke, watch what you eat, control your blood pressure and avoid diabetes, and establish strong social networks. Another topic that this section of the book covered in some detail was depression. Depression is a mental disorder characterized by pervasive sadness and other negative emotions that interfere with the ability to work, study, sleep, eat, and enjoy formerly pleasurable activities. Memory lapse or Alzheimer’s is also mentioned within this chapter and connected to depression. This section of the chapter also covered the topic of how people fear gaining. Although aging is a normal process and inevitable, it is often viewed as a disease. The book also mentions the term ageism. This refers to discrimination against people on the basis of age, particularly against older people.
The next major section of Chapter 17 is work and retirement. Retirement, the exit from the paid labor force is becoming more elusive. In this section we learn that older people are working longer and this can be contributed to reasons such as social security and medicare. This section also discussed how many older Americans cannot find work. It stated that in mid-2009 almost 7 percent of people age 65 and older were unemployed and actively looking for work. When this section began talking about variations in retirement income, the main topics focused on gender, race and ethnicity, marital status, and social class. Here, social class is considered the most important factor in retirement income because it has a big effect on people’s physical and emotional well-being.
Grandparenting is the next section discussed in this chapter. This section begins with grandparenting styles which include remote or detached, companionate and supportive, involved and influential, advisory and authoritative, and cultural transmitters. Remote or detached relationships occur when grandparents and grandchildren live far apart and see each other infrequently, maintaining a largely ritualistic, symbolic relationship. Companionate and supportive style of grandparenting is the most common pattern, and is where supportive grandparents see their grandchildren often, frequently do things with them, and offer them emotional and instrumental support. Involved and influential grandparenting is when grandparents play an active role in their grandchildren’s lives. These grandparents may be spontaneous but they also exert substantial authority over their grandchildren, imposing rules. Advisory and authoritative grandparenting is when grandparents serve as an advisor. Also within this section, grandparents as surrogate parents are discussed. The first topic within this section is custodial grandparents. They have a legal relationship with their grandchildren through adoption, guardianship, or custody. Similar to this concept is living-with grandparents. These typically have the grandchild in their own home or less commonly, live in the home of a grandchild’s parents, and can also be a reason for the increase in the number of multigenerational households. Multigenerational households are homes in which three or more generations live together. They represent about 4 percent of all American households. Grandparents sometimes act as a role of a day-care. Here, these grandparents assume responsibilities for the physical care of their grandchildren, usually a daughter’s until the parents come home from work. This section of the chapter also discusses grandparents and divorce and the roles in which they play in their children’s divorces and how grandchildren are affected by their grandparent’s divorce. Following this is the topic of grandparent’s visitation rights..
Chapter 17 continues with the discussion of aging parents, adult children, and siblings. This begins with discussing the relationships between parents and adult children and sibling relationships in later life. There are five groups that sibling relationships in later life generally fall into including intimate siblings, congenial siblings, loyal siblings, apathetic siblings, and hostile siblings.
Benokraitis continues this chapter with a section on dying, death, and bereavement. This section begins with the general discussion on experiencing death and dying. Within this section is a discussion of health care professionals, and patients, families, and friends. A key concept brought to the forefront of this chapter is the term dying trajectory. This refers to the speed with which a person dies because of declining physical functions. There can be a lingering trajectory, such as a terminal illness like cancer, or there is the quick trajectory, which is an acute crisis caused by cardiac arrest or a serious accident. This section of the chapter also continues to discuss the hospice care for the dying, the right to die with dignity, and coping with death. Bereavement is mentioned here, which is the process of recovery after the death of someone we felt close to. People who have experienced such a loss are known as the bereaved. Two of the common emotional reactions that occur during this are grief, which the emotional response to loss, and mourning, which is the customary outward expression to grief. This section further goes into depth of the phases of grief and the duration and intensity of it.
The chapter then continues with discussing being widowed and single in later life. Widowed people may move on and forge new relationships through dating, cohabitation, and remarriage. Also discussed in this section of the chapter are who are the widowed, which across the older age groups women are found more likely than men, facing widowhood, and forging new relationships. This final section of the chapter discusses how some begin to date within a few years of losing a mate, but that companionship is the most important reason for dating.
Chapter 17 continues with the discussion of family caregiving in later life. Within this part of the chapter are discussions of who are the caregivers and recipients, the different caregiving styles of adult children, the satisfactions and strains of caregiving, and other support systems. Some of the caregiving styles of adult children that were mentioned were the routine help, which is the backbone of caregiving for older parents, backups, which is when siblings serve as backups, circumscribed, which is limited but predictable and agreed upon, sporadic, which describes adult children who provide services to parents at their own convenience, and disassociated, which occurs when sisters and brothers know what they can’t count on a sibling at all. The final section of this chapter revolved its focus on the competition for resources including some financial costs of an aging society, and if there are any solutions.
What was interesting/what did I learn:
I found it interesting how accurately I was finding myself agree with the traits of each of the grandparenting styles. Although I think that grandparents can be a mixture of two or more of these, the one that really stuck out to me was the companionate and supportive style of grandparenting. The book states that these grandparents are typically on the maternal side of the family and are younger. I tend to find my grandmother doing many of these things and when I visit her we are always either watching TV shows together, or eating as a family. This may be different for me because I have only ever had one side of grandparents, but I can definitely see how this is the most common grandparenting style.
Question:
Do you think people are cognizant of using ageism (the discrimination against people on the basis of age, particularly against older people) in a negative manner? How upset would you be if you were older and someone treated you like a little child when you feel that you are capable of doing almost the same amount of work and the same tasks as before?
I do feel that people are aware of ageism and that people do get discriminated against due to age. One can never be over informed on any issue. I don’t understand how someone would not be aware that they are discriminating towards anyone for any reason because awareness is brought forth on television, internet and radio. Even if a person is illiterate, there are many venues for becoming educated in discrimination.
ReplyDeleteI would be highly upset if I was discriminated against because of my age. I was actually discriminated against at my last full time job as a pastry chef. I worked with a middle-aged woman. I feel that she would always “throw me under the bus” when a manager was near by to make her self stand out more because she was intimated by me. She treated me like a child and I hated that. I also know several people who are older and cannot find employment due to their age. It does happen.
In my previous job, I worked very hard and made beautiful desserts while the older woman could not keep up. She constantly ridiculed me and another younger pastry chef saying we didn’t do our jobs. However, when it came to the bottom line, her dessert were never up to par and management did eventually see this.
I think I would be upset. This makes me think of the episode on the Fresh Prince of Belair where Phillip prevents his mother from doing anything while she's visiting. Especially, because she's getting over a cold if I remember correctly. She's outraged that he won't let her go swimming or do any of the activities with the family.
ReplyDeleteJust because someone has aged doesn't mean their incapable of doing the things they used to do. I think this is what tends to cause depression or anger in older people when their children treat them as though their incapable of living alone or living period. We tend to act as though they're dying when they're perfectly fine. Granted the elderly are more prone to have issues when they do get sick at that age or engage in some activities, but we tend to take our protection to the extreme.
I would want the same treatment and recognition that others received. My grandfather is in his eighties and he still works, cooks, cleans, etc. We don't treat him as though he's older because he's proven to be able to take care of himself, but more importantly because we allowed him to show that he's capable instead of automatically assuming he couldn't. Sometimes I think he'll outlive me the way he goes around doing things! haha!