When we reach middle age, we don’t just fear a decline in our minds and bodies, we bank on it. Could this expectation about ageing play a role in how we age? Could we get older better if we expected differently?
Image courtesy of Pexels, Alena Darmel
“I just couldn’t remember that person’s name last week,” we say in horror. Our forgetfulness might be age-related, but it might also not be. Maybe we have just been having a stressful time and an otherwise occupied mind. Nonetheless, we blame it on the way we are ageing. “My knees are really cracking these days. It must be my age,” we say. But perhaps we’ve been sitting at our desk for too long.
And so, the moment has come. We have reached that dreadful time in life of being “old”. We have succombed to ageing, and from now on we expect a natural decline in our body and mind.
Experts have been telling us for years that from middle age onwards we will fall victim to all kinds of ailments. We will have difficulty naming things. From now on, we should think twice before learning a new language or applying for a new job. We can completely forget about starting a new career. You could say that we all subject ourselves to it. After all, we are getting older.
Turns out, our individual assumptions about how we each age, sometimes called ‘expectations regarding ageing (ERA)‘ are not very positive. Most older adults just do not expect to age well.
It doesn’t help that we have such negative stereotypes in general about other older people. We tend to see them as frail, vulnerable and you could say, even somewhat comical.
Ageing: It starts early!
But the problem is not just that we view other, older people in this way. It turns out that our discrimination against older generations, or ageing stereotypes, is having a negative effect on our own health as we get older!
Society will benefit from this ageing population if we all age more healthily,” said Alana Officer, World Health Organisation (WHO) Coordinator of Ageing and Life Course, reflecting on this. “But to do that,” she added, “we must stamp out ageist prejudices.”
Another thing that those who have looked into it have brought to light, is that this seed, if you like, this way of thinking, is already firmly planted in our minds early in life. Already when we are young, we notice how elderly generation is viewed and we take that on board, and this affects our own health later on.
All in all, authorities such as the WHO, which calls ageism neglected global health issue, are showing us that ageism, healthy life expectancy and population ageing are all related.
Positive ageing: It’s all in the expectation?
So, what if this mentality, this expectation, has a self-fulfilling effect on our health? If we and others keep saying that our bodies and minds will go downhill, will some of it happen? And can we age better by having different expectations?
It is said we each have our own unique ‘subjective age’. That we feel younger or older than our real age. So, if we think we are younger than we really are, and expect to age well, can the body follow suit?
Turning things around
It was the famous Counterclockwise study by social psychologist Dr. Ellen Langer from the 1950s that showed us that we can ‘think ourselves young.’ The people that had submitted themselves to the experiment lived for a while in a very special house. It was built to mimic exactly what it was like when these people were young. Turned out, this imagined life had had a positive effect on their health! They knew on a conscious level it was not real, but somehow it worked. They were thinking themselves young, researchers have said since.
Harvard Magazine for instance reported that the participants had had improved in height, weight, gait, posture, hearing, vision and even on intelligence. Their joints were reportedly more flexible, their shoulders wider, and their fingers more agile and less gnarled by arthritis. No mean feat?
When a BBC programme from 2010 created a similar experiment to Dr. Langer’s, it had comparable results. Its participants lived in a house that mimicked life of the 70s, and when reviewed afterwards, these partipants too had had their ‘memory, mood, flexibility, stamina and eyesight improved in almost all of them.’ The creator of the programme, Michael Mosley, wrote afterwards: “It made a compelling case for Ellen Langer’s argument that opening our minds to what’s possible can lead to better health, whatever our age.”
“It made a compelling case for Ellen Langer’s argument that opening our minds to what’s possible can lead to better health, whatever our age.”
Other perspectives out there
Random House Books writes that we can learn from the previously-mentioned counterclockwork study. That all we need are subtle shifts in our thinking, our language, in our expectations. And that we can begin to change the ingrained behaviours that sap our health, optimism, and vitality. And also, that the limits we assume and impose on ourselves are not real.
Because our perceptions about the negative effects of ageing are very persistent. But, there are other perspectives out there.
Take the international learning community The Taos Institute from the US. It argues there is a need to challenge the longstanding view of ageing as decline. One of its newsletters puts the focus on positive ageing. By moving our focus from repair and prevention to growth-enhancing activities, it writes, we can achieve a different societal view on ageing.
The negative ideas about ageing that many cultures insist on, writes Be Independent HomeCare from Ireland, once internalised, can act as a self-fulfilling prophecy. One that increases the odds of ill health and depression.
In a similar way, the Australian Positive Psychology Institute calls a positive attitude towards ageing vital. Studies indicate that a positive attitude improves physical and mental health, the institute has pointed out.
The future of positive ageing…but then differently?
According to Professor Nancy A. Pachana in the field of psychology there is room for improvement related to ageing. Professor Pachana is Co-Director of the Ageing Mind Initiative, School of Psychology, The University of Queensland. She has been advocating a focus in psychology on wellness and adaptation in late life. And that this should include the concepts of successful and positive ageing.
When we asked Prof. Pachana whether she believes this approach of expecting to age healthily could be beneficial in the field of psychology, she replied: “Yes, I think it can, and it is in fact a very POSITIVE approach to ageing well!”
Perhaps next time our knees creak, or we would like to apply or a new job at a late stage in life, we can consider something new. For example, that the ageing process might be less fixed than most of us might think. Or even, that we can control this process more than we think.
“Many cultures still maintain negative ideas about ageing, and if internalised these can act as a ‘self-fulfilling prophecy’ that greatly increases the odds of ill health and depression.”
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