CHAPTER 16CHAPTER 16

Middle Adulthood: Social and Emotional Middle Adulthood: Social and Emotional DevelopmentDevelopment

Theories of Development in Middle Theories of Development in Middle AdulthoodAdulthood

Erik Erikson’s Theory of Psychosocial Development

• Believed major psychological challenge of the middle years is generativity versus stagnation

• Generativity– ability to generate or produce; based on instinctual drive toward

procreativity (bearing and rearing children)– can consist of parenting one’s own children, helping others with

their children, being engaged in projects that will influence future generations

• Stagnation– rejection of generativity drive can result in a life stripped of

meaning and purpose

Daniel Levinson’s Seasons

• Midlife transition– The years from 40 to 45– Psychological shift into middle adulthood often accompanied by

a crisis during which people fear they have more to look back upon than forward to

• Midlife crisis– Time of dramatic self-doubt and anxiety during which people

sense the passing of their youth and become preoccupied with concern about the imminence of their own mortality

– May be imposed from external factors such as downsizing

Entering Midlife: Crisis, Turning Point, or Prime of Life?

• Midlife usually identified around age 35 for women and age 40 for men; women reach it about five years earlier mostly due to reproductive awareness

• Due to unrealized dreams and life losses, psychotherapy during this time should not be overlooked.

• Midlife can be prime of life if the person has continued to develop in an area of expertise or interest– Little if any fluid intelligence lost and crystallized intelligence

growing

Entering Midlife: Crisis, Turning Point, or Prime of Life? (cont’d)

• Middle-aged adults, especially professionals, are often earning more money than young adults.– Tend to be geographically and vocationally settled– Most have built systems of social support and may be involved

in endearing romantic and social relationships as well as have children

• Flip side of middle adulthood– The overwhelming responsibility of taking care of your own

family, helping with your aging parents, and remaining in the workplace all at once

The Life-Events Approach

• Life-events approach – Focuses on the particular challenges that are likely to face

people at this time of life rather than phases or stages

• Stressful life events in middle adulthood– Death of a spouse, child, parent, or sibling– Changes in health– Caring for one’s parents– Financial difficulties– Concern about one’s appearance, weight, or aging– Moving– Change in employment; changes in relationships; changes in

responsibilities at work

The Life-Events Approach (cont’d)

• Many middle-aged women do not experience “empty nest syndrome”. – Instead, they take advantage of their new time by being in the

workplace and finding life satisfaction in other activities besides childrearing and homemaking

• Supportive social network, positive attitude, and a sense of control help to mitigate the effects of stress and foster feelings of well-being among midlife adults.

Stability and Change in Middle AdulthoodStability and Change in Middle Adulthood

Stability and Change in Middle Adulthood

• Personalities tend to mature rather than be shaped by environmental conditions.

• Expression of personality traits is influenced by culture.

Are There Sudden Shifts in Personality?

• The “big five” personality traits tend to show stability over time.

• Some trends of group personality changes over the years, but introverted tend to remain introverted, extroverted tend to remain extroverted

• Neuroticism declines over time; agreeableness and conscientiousness increase over time; extraversion and openness to new experience decline slightly over time

Table 16-1, p. 336

Personality Themes among College-Educated Women

• Women in their 40’s scored higher on personality scales than women in their 20’s.

• Higher for women in their 60’s in the areas of identity certainty, confident power, and concern about aging

• Personal distress toward aging decreases with age, suggesting older women have become more settled.

Work in Middle AdulthoodWork in Middle Adulthood

Job Satisfaction

• Only 45% of American workers are satisfied with their jobs.

• Job satisfaction increases steadily throughout adulthood.– Increased expertise and income– Workers are more realistic in middle adulthood

• Blue collar workers– Report feelings of alienation and dissatisfaction due to supervisors

treating them disrespectfully especially when supervisor is younger than them

• Women balance work and home but still feel effects of “glass ceiling”

Career Changes in Middle Adulthood

• Most changes in careers occur during young adulthood due to responsibilities of middle adults’ life.

• Most career changes in middle adulthood are shifts into related fields.

• Radical shifts in career can be successful.

• Crisis such as divorce, conflict with a coworker, or getting fired may force the middle adult to take any job he/she can find.

Unemployment

• Unemployed adults display lower physical and psychological well-being than their employed counterparts.

• Unemployed middle-aged adults have lower well-being than unemployed young adults.

• Unemployed middle-aged adults for whom work was more important, had fewer financial resources and social supports, and blamed themselves for the unemployment, fared the worst.

• Older women will take lower-paying jobs as long as they like the work.

Relationships in Middle AdulthoodRelationships in Middle Adulthood

Evolving Parent-Child Relationships

• Parents are stressed when adolescents do not exert self-control and they have to direct them in multiple areas of their life.

• Children who are young adults may still be financially reliant upon their parents. – Some still live at home

• Parents balance between staying in touch with the young adult and interfering with their life choices.

• Living at home as a young adult differs according to culture as well as location.

• Married children present new family members (in-laws) who may or may not enrich their parents’ lives.

Grandparenting

• Grandparents have to choose between reckless interference or painful neglect.

• Having grandchildren is viewed as a positive life event.• Grandparents spend a higher proportion of their time

with their grandchildren in recreational and educational activities.

• Grandchildren tend to spend more time with their grandmothers than with their grandfathers all the way through adolescence.

• Grandchildren tend to be more involved with maternal grandparents than paternal grandparents.

Grandparenting (cont’d)

• Grandparents tend to have resources such as trips available for grandchildren, but parents do the caretaking.

• Grandparents have less influence on their grandchildren when they live with them.– Conflicts between adult children and grandparents ensue over

parenting

• Some grandparents end up the custodial parent to their grandchildren.– Changes the lifestyle of the middle adult and introduces

emotional challenges as well as balancing issues

Middle-Aged Children with Aging Parents

• Most elderly parents live near one of their middle-aged children.

• Most burden of taking care of the elderly parents falls on the middle-aged daughter

• Sandwich generation refers to middle-aged daughter taking care of her own children and/or grandchildren as well as her aging parents

• Middle-aged female may also be working, causing more stress; if lucky, she will have a sibling living nearby to help out

Siblings

• Most people in middle adulthood have at least one living sibling.

• Nature of sibling relationships reflect the childhood relationship

• Some sibling relationships get better as they take care of aging parents together.

• On the other hand, sibling relationship may suffer if only one of the siblings is taking care of the elderly parent.

Friends

• Adults in middle adulthood tend to have fewer friends.

• Middle-aged adults place value on the friends they do have.

• Their friends tend to mirror them in interests, activities, and years of mutual experiences.

• Male friends tend to be more competitive and less likely to be intimate than female friends.

• Loss of a friend is felt very deeply.