A Note on Restriction of Life Space: Attitudes of Age Cohorts

Abstract

Many recent studies of older people have been concerned with the validity of the theory of disengagement. Briefly stated, this theory assumes that disengagement is an inevitable process associated with aging which many of the relationships between a person and other members of society are severed, and those remaining are altered in quality. The theory further assumes that ego energy declines with age, and that as persons age they experience increased self-preoccupation and presumably decreased response to normative controls. Data from a nationwide sample study of persons aged 65 years or more permit comparisons of the attitudes of successive age cohorts from age 65 to 69 to age 85. The findings indicate that with advances in age, old people in the United States apparently do become increasingly preoccupied. On the other hand, there seems to be no evidence from the data for the decrease in response to normative controls also suggested by the theory. The data suggest that most old people harbor weak or non-existent age group identifications, and that most old people are optimists. A key question seems to be whether the present findings are associated with aging in a particular culture, the United States, or whether they have a more general application.

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