Old age
Perspectives
Adaptable describes most people in their old age. Despite the stressfulness of old age, they are described as "agreeable" and "accepting". However, old age dependence induces feelings of incompetence and worthlessness in a minority. Caution marks old age. This antipathy toward "risk-taking" stems from the fact that old people have less to gain and more to lose by taking risks than younger people. Depressed mood. According to Cox, Abramson, Devine, and Hollon (2012), old age is a risk factor for depression caused by prejudice (i.e., "deprejudice"). When people are prejudiced against the elderly and then become old themselves, their anti-elderly prejudice turns inward, causing depression. "People with more negative age stereotypes will likely have higher rates of depression as they get older." Old age depression results in the over-65 population having the highest suicide rate. Fear of crime in old age, especially among the frail, sometimes weighs more heavily than concerns about finances or health and restricts what they do. The fear persists in spite of the fact that old people are victims of crime less often than younger people. Increasing fear of health loss. Mental disorders afflict about 15% of people aged 60+ according to estimates by the World Health Organization. Another survey taken in 15 countries reported that mental disorders of adults interfered with their daily activities more than physical problems. Reduced mental and cognitive ability may afflict old age.Memory loss is common in old age due to the decrease in speed of information being encoded, stored, and retrieved. It takes more time to learn the same amount of new information. Dementia is a general term for memory loss and other intellectual abilities serious enough to interfere with daily life. Its prevalence increases in old age from about 10% at age 65 to about 50% over age 85. Alzheimer's disease accounts for 50 to 80 percent of dementia cases. Demented behavior can include wandering, physical aggression, verbal outbursts, depression, and psychosis. Set in one's ways describes a mind set of old age. A study of over 400 distinguished men and women in old age found a "preference for the routine". Explanations include old age's toll on the "fluid intelligence" and the "more deeply entrenched" ways of the old. Many books by middle-age writers depict their perceptions of old people. One writer notices the change in his parents: they move slowly, they have lost strength, they repeat stories, their minds wander, and they fret. Another writer sees her aged parents and is bewildered: they refuse to follow her advice, they are obsessed with the past, they avoid risk, they live at a "glacial pace".
Old age-26