Attitudes towards old age and its preferred image in early adulthood

Abstract

The signs of biological aging take a pronounced form in late adulthood (at the age of 60–65 age – to death). Therefore psychological and social old age is associated with this stage in society. In general age-related changes of a person differ by their individual and unique scenario. However the prevailing negative image of the society of late adulthood forms in the individual fear of entry into this age range. It is necessary to take preventive measures to minimize the existing unfavorable image of old age and to revise the attitude to this stage of ontogenesis. Just for this purpose a study was conducted on the Belarusian sample to identify attitudes regarding old age and its preferred image. The study involved 125 people aged 18–37 years. The study helped to reveal attitudes regarding old age. It also defines the opportunities and social role that older people should realize. The article presents the results of the preferred image of the future of old age according to young people. The factors contributing to the formation of a prosperous and unfavorable scenario of personality development in old age are presented in this article. These tasks make up the scientific novelty of the research. Respondents were asked to continue the 8 unfinished proposals that had been pre-evaluated by experts. The results were processed using quantitative and qualitative content analysis. It is concluded that the favorable passage of the individual period of late adulthood can contribute to the broadcast media the following image of old age: it is the natural stage of human development, accompanied by a deterioration of the functional system of the body, which can lead to the inaccessibility of some areas of social life. However when working on yourself in early and middle adulthood it is possible to make the aging process not so destructive.