Forever 21 Thesis

These stereotypes, however, are very far from the truth about what occurs during the late adulthood stage. They stem from a form of prejudice referred to as ageism (Berger, 2008). Gerontologists define ageism as “A form of prejudice used to categorize and judge individual based on their chronological age only” (Berger, 2008, p. 615). The issue of ageism can promote patronizing treatment toward persons in the late adulthood stage and even foster discrimination. For example, people in the West unconsciously process

I will be presenting part of what I am thinking to write about in the chapter, at the Aging and Society's 6th Interdisciplinary conference in October. If the presentation would not violate the terms of the chapter submission, I would be very happy to contribute to the book.

The humanity of aging is a concept sometimes hard to grasp. Understanding why we are

Many studies, such as one called thean Implicit Association Test, have been done to research attitudes about different stereotyped traits such as race, gender, and age. For example, one such test conducted in 2006 had subjects categorize words and images by pressing a button on the left or right side of a computer when presented with either a picture of an African American or a European American and either a positive or negative word. The reaction times were measured because as the researchers stated “Participants will press keys faster when the categories produce cognitive consonance rather than dissonance...Thus, someone with an implicit preference for whites will respond faster when [European American] faces are paired with pleasant words than when [African American] faces are paired with pleasant words”. And if I completely lost you there, that pretty much boils down to this- when the subjects favor one race they are faster to click the button when a good word and “good” face are together because to them it makes more sense. And this, is a much more difficult habit to

The interconnected nature of social categorizations such as race, class, and gender as they apply

Most of people tend not to think too much about old age, they don't want to. They’re in denial, they fear aging. Retirement is seen as the end of productivity, a death sentence. And that is why so many of us fear aging, it leads to an inevitable conclusion, death. Author and feminist Betty Friedan brilliantly challenges this preconceived idea we have about aging. She shook the country in the 1960s with her "The Feminine Mystique”. She gave shape to a major women's movement that continues to reverberate today. Women were regarded as housewives, viewed solely on the basis of biological functions.

In today’s world, the older generations are living longer than ever before. Prior to recent times, seniors were not expected to reach their 70’s or beyond. Now, the 85+-year-old age cohort is becoming the fastest growing cohort in the United States (Transgenerational). Therefore, it is essential for the government, researchers, as well as the individuals in the growing age cohort, to fight the negative stigmas of growing older, as well as preserve their health in order to lead happy and healthy lives.

Have you ever judged a person by their age, gender or appearance rather than really knowing them? When you meet a tattooed man on the street, your first impression of him might be bad, i.e. a negative categorization, since tattoos are associated with criminals and unemployed people. However, he could be a person who does volunteer and works as a business manager. People tend to automatically categorize a person into groups by visual judgements, demographic features, personality and own perceptions or beliefs (Billig & Tajfel, 1973). Social categorization is a process of classifying people into different groups based on their similar characteristics and group memberships. It is a natural part of social perception and serves a basic epistemic and identity function in organizing and structuring people’s knowledge about the world and make things become manageable in daily life (Bodenhausen, Kang & Peery, 2012). It occurs spontaneously without much thoughts (Crips & Hewstone, 2007). In social categorization, we usually form a general conclusion about other people and begin to respond to them as a member of a particular social group than as individuals. It allows us to communicate and connect with those who share the same or similar group membership. Social groups that we use in social categorization can change under different situations and over time. Whaley and Link (1998) discovered that there is a strong association between categorization and stereotype-based judgments. For

Admittedly, the older adults witnessed in the videos is yet captivating. The healthy take charge, life is not over yet attitude is not often seen or even advertised. The images seen were visions of strength, endurance, and resilience. It was obvious they did not adopt myths regarding aging as they rebelled against it. It was as if their images of aging were re-wired making new connections with their environment and all that was in it. The display of happiness through engagement, pleasure, and meaning was achieved as we saw a mixture of satisfaction. Truly they made aging a positive experience. Initiatives were introduced to give the older adults more choices, the community support was strong and holistic alternatives were made available centered on the current

It is not easy to come up with a working definition of aging; different academics around the world defined ‘aging’ from different perspectives. Based on the collected information I have, I define aging –a multidimensional process of physiological, mental and social changes that occurred over the course of life. Though it is beyond human control, aging experiences may vary between individuals. “In the developed world, chronological time plays a paramount role. The age of 60 or 65, roughly equivalent to retirement ages in most developed countries is said to be the beginning of old age. In many parts of the developing world, chronological time has little or no importance in the meaning of old age. Other socially constructed meanings of age are more significant such as the roles assigned to older people; in some cases it is the loss of roles accompanying physical decline which is significant in defining old age. Thus, in contrast to the chronological milestones which mark life stages in the developed world, old age in many developing countries is seen to begin at the point when active contribution is no longer possible." (Gorman, 2000)

Unconcious bias often happens without those holding the discriminatory views being aware that their behavior has such characteristics (pg.128-129, Pynes). Since its inception, the U.S. has had a racial makeup has placed whites as a majority. It has also had a long, normalized history of racial tension and violence. These factor combined results in unconscious discriminatory acts seeming insignificant in comparison, which makes it easy for white Americans to completely disregard them. An individual's race is a highly visible trait and has significant cultural implications. As a result, this easily accessible information can quickly be analyzed and used as a base for automatic categorization which, in turn, structures a societies' social hierarchies. It is important to note that this function is not intentional, nor entirely, malicious. The purpose of instinctive classifying is data-reduction, helping an individual’s mind manage the massive volumes of stimuli constantly being processed. (pg.364, 375, Fiske) However, this process does intrinsically lead to false perceptions, stereotyping, and a biased evaluation of others, a preference for in-group members and a disfavor for out-group members. The group preference from these biases construct the segments of a population to whom

Prejudice, discrimination, and stereotyping are important topics at the cause of debating within social psychology. A stereotype is a generalization about a group of people, in which certain traits cling to all members, regardless of actual individual variation (Akert, Aronson, & Wilson, 2010). As humans, people assign objects and individuals into categories to organize the environment. Individuals do this for not only organization, but also survival. Is stereotyping inevitable? That is the question; according to Devine (2007), it is, but Lepore and Brown (2007) have to disagree. Devine believes that “stereotyping is automatic, which makes it inevitable.” On the other hand, Lepore and Brown are not convinced that stereotyping is

According to the recent studies the older people as compared to the youth are becoming more economically and demographically attractive. However, there are costs of an aging population that the society bears as a whole. (Andrews, 2009)

Aging and being old was dominated by negative characteristics and conditions such as illness, depression, and isolation for a long time (Eibach, Mock, & Courtney, 2010). At first glance the terms “success” and “aging” seem to be in conflict to each other. When asking people about aging, their answers have many facets that are also found in psychological definitions: successful aging is seen as health, maturity and personal growth, self-acceptance, happiness, generativity, coping, and acceptance of age-related limitations. In the psychological sense successful aging is also often seen as the absence of age-associated characteristics (Strawbridge, Wallhagen, & Cohen, 2002). It seems that successful aging means is not aging.

Society has a way of making assumptions based on one’s physical characteristics. Often at times we categorize individuals to a particular social group. In regard to society’ perception of an individual this however, contributes to the development of social construction of racism. Most people want to be identified as individuals rather than a member of specific social group. As a result, our social identity contains different categories or components that were influenced or imposed. For example, I identify as a, Jamaican, Puerto Rican and a person of color. I identify racially as a person of color and ethically as Jamaican and Puerto Rican. According to Miller and Garren it’s a natural human response for people to make assumptions solely