Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-fscjk Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-26T01:16:44.867Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Construction of Meaning in Old Age:† Possibilities and Constraints

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 November 2008

Freya Dittmann-Kohli
Freya Dittmann-Kohli
Affiliation:
Max-Planck-Institut für Bildungsforschung, Berlin, Federal Republic of Germany.
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Historically, ageing processes have often been perceived as growing constraints to a good life, but proposals for a reorganization of positive meanings also date back at least to Roman times. In order to study age-related reorganization of meaning, self-descriptive statements of 300 young and 300 elderly adults were collected with a sentence completion test. A coding scheme was used to identify age-specific meaning patterns.

In contrast to young adults, elderly people completed problem- and future-oriented sentence stems significantly more often by referring to negative aspects of their own ageing process. Nevertheless, their answers to self-referent sentence stems showed that they used significantly more positive and fewer negative or ambivalent statements about self and life. The analysis of the overall patterns of cognitions in both age groups suggested that, within the existential constraints of old age, positive meaning is created by elderly people through various cognitive-affective strategies. For instance, instead of maintaining high expectations for life realization and self-development, the elderly change their standards, becoming more self-accepting and value more highly what is already given and still available. Conclusions are drawn about life-span development and modifiability of meaning.

Type
Research Article
Information
Ageing & Society , Volume 10 , Issue 3 , September 1990 , pp. 279 - 294
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1990

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Aylwin, S. 1985. Structure in Thought and Feeling. Methuen, London.Google Scholar
Baltes, P. B. 1987. Theoretical propositions of life-span developmental psychology: on the dynamics between growth and decline. Developmental Psychology, 23 (5), 611–26.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bengtson, V. L., Reedy, M. N. and Gordon, C. 1985. Aging and self-conceptions: personality processes and social contexts. In Birren, J. E. and Schaie, K. W. (eds) Handbook of the Psychology of Aging, second edition. Van Nostrand, New York.Google Scholar
Berger, P. L. and Luckmann, T. 1966. The Social Construction of Reality. Doubleday, New York.Google Scholar
Bromley, D. B. 1977. Personality Description in Ordinary Language. Wiley, London.Google Scholar
Cicero 1965. Cato der Ältere über das Greisenalter. Reclam Universal-Bibliothek, Stuttgart.Google Scholar
Dittmann-Kohli, F. 1987a. Personal meaning systems and life meaning: theoretical facets and a life-span perspective. Max Planck Institute for Human Development and Education, Berlin (unpublished manuscript).Google Scholar
Dittmann-Kohli, F. 1987b. Erfolgreiches Altern aus subjektiver Sicht. Paper presented at the Meeting of the German Gerontological Society, 14–1601, Berlin. In Baltes, M. M., Kohli, M. and Sames, K. (eds) Erfolgreiches Altem: Bedingungen und Variationen. Huber, Bern. In press.Google Scholar
Dittmann-Kohli, F. 1988a. Sinndimensionen im Frühen und Späten Erwachsenenalter. In Bierhoff, H. -W. and Nienhaus, R. (eds) Psychogerontologie (pp. 73–114). Universität Marburg, Marburg.Google Scholar
Dittmann-Kohli, F. 1988b. Self and meaning of life: central domains of personality development in adulthood. In Rapoport T., Ben-Ari E. and Haste H. (eds). Changing Lives, Lives in Change: Interdisciplinary Study of the Life Course. In press.Google Scholar
Dittmann-Kohli, F. 1989a. Zur Konstruktion von Lebenssinn und Zufriedenheit im Alter. In Knopf, D., Schaefter, U. and Schmidt, R. (eds) Produktivität des Alters (pp. 186–207). Deutsches Zentrum für Altersfragen, Berlin.Google Scholar
Dittmann-Kohli, F. 1989b. Erfolgreiches Altern aus subjektiver sicht. In Baltes, M. M., Kohli, M. and Sames, K. (eds) Erfolgreiches Altern. Bedingungen und Variationen. Huber, Bern.Google Scholar
Erikson, E. H. 1968. The human life cycle, International Encyclopedia of Social Science. McMillan and Free Press, New York.Google Scholar
Graesser, A. C. 1981. Prose Comprehension Beyond the Word. Springer, New York.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lerner, M. J. and Gignac, M. 1988. Coping and Growth among the Elderly. Invited address presented at the Canadian Psychological Association Meetings, Montreal, 10 06.Google Scholar
Kihlstrom, J. F. and Cantor, N. 1984. Mental representation of the self. In Berkowitz, L. (ed) Advances in Experimental and Social Psychology, Vol. 17. Academic Press, New York.Google Scholar
Markus, H. and Wurf, E. 1987. The dynamic self-concept: a social psychological perspective. Annual Review of Psychology, 38, 299–337.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nies, H. and Munnichs, J. 1986. Sinngebung und Altern. Deutsches Zentrum für Altersfragen, Berlin.Google Scholar
Nuttin, J. 1984. Motivation, Planning, and Action: A Relational Theory of Behavior. Leuven University Press, Leuven and Erlbaum, Hillsdale, NJ.Google Scholar
Nuttin, J. and Lens, W. 1985. Future Time Perspective and Motivation. Leuven University Press, Leuven and Erlbaum, Hillsdale, NJ.Google Scholar
Pekrun, R. 1988. Emotion, Motivation and Persönlichkeit. Psychologie Verlagsunion, München.Google Scholar
Pietrasinski, Z. 1988. Toward a theory of autonomizing promotion of adult development. Polish Psychological Bulletin, 19, 31–41.Google Scholar
Reker, G. T. and Wong, T. P. 1988. Aging as an individual process: toward a theory of personal meaning. In Birren, J. E. and Bengtson, V. L. (eds) Emergent Theories of Aging. Springer, New York.Google Scholar
Schank, R. C. and Abelson, R. 1977. Scripts, Plans, Goals and Understanding. Erlbaum, Hillsdale, NJ.Google Scholar
Schütz, A. 1971. Strukturen der Lebenswelt. In Schütz, I. (ed) Gesammelte Aufsätze, vol III. Nijhoff, Den Haag.Google Scholar
Searle, J. R. 1983. Intentionality. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Taylor, S. E. 1983. Adjustment to threatening events: a theory of cognitive adaptation. American Psychologist, 38, 1161–73.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tergan, S.-O. 1986. Modelle der Wissenrepräsentation als Grundlage qualitativer Wissensdiagnostik. Westdeutscher Verlag, Opladen.CrossRefGoogle Scholar