When his next-door neighbors in a quaint New England town suddenly pick up and move to a gated retired community in Florida called The Villages, Andrew Blechman is astonished by their stories, so he goes to investigate. Larger than Manhattan, with a golf course for every day of the month, two downtowns, its own newspaper, radio, and TV station, The Villages is a city of nearly one hundred thousand (and growing) missing only one thing: children. In the critically acclaimed Leisureville, Blechman delves into life in the senior utopia, offering a hilarious firsthand report on everything from ersatz nostalgia to the residents' surprisingly active sex life. But this is more than just a romp through a retirement paradise; Blechman traces the history of the age-segregated retirement phenomenon, and travels to Arizona to show what has happened to the pioneering developments after decades of segregation. A fascinating blend of serious history, social commentary, and hilarious, engaging reportage, Leisureville is an important book on a major, underreported trend.

This book provides readers with a compelling case for the inclusion of contextual therapy in comprehensive healthcare settings by presenting its applications to individual and family health across the lifespan. Part I gives an overview of contextual therapy, including case conceptualization, assessment, intervention, and supervision. Part II provides specific recommendations for incorporating contextual therapy in diverse and multidisciplinary settings. Case studies illustrate how concepts such as justice, loyalty, and balanced giving and receiving influence families' adjustment to chronic illnesses and mental health disorders. Accounting for the trend toward increased collaboration between providers in traditional mental health and medical settings, this book will empower clinicians to expand their current range of assessment methods, intervention techniques, and supervision experiences

Addresses the personal dimensions of transitioning from full-time work to retirement life.

Ageism is too often an accepted form of bias, even though the facts support the value of aging. Airline pilots forced to retire at the arbitrary age of 65 are usually at the top of their game. Forced retirement in most organizations remove highly skilled performers as well as role models and trainers for newer generations. Instead of revelling in who we are, we begin to try to look younger as soon as possible, with 16-year-old women receiving nose and breast surgery as birthday presents. People have become inured to "losing" abilities as they age instead of appreciating new abilities that only age can bestow. Everyone extols the need for gender equality, lest we lose the talents of half of our population. Yet, people over 65 are currently 15 percent of the US population (46.2 million) and is projected to rise to 34 percent. Due to the IRA legislation of the Reagan era - and the lack of need to purchase homes, college educations, cars, or health care-the discretionary assets are also substantial. It's time these people took control of their lives and influence on everything from business to politics.

There are more than 15 million people aged over 65 currently living in the MENA region, yet little attention has been paid to the cultural significance of growing old. This book recognises the widespread silence by countering the critical corpus that reads modern Arabic novels as a political discourse with an emphasis on youth achievement. By assembling a range of fictional works from different parts of the Arab world that incorporate older characters, this book draws on a range of theoretical approaches to aging, particularly from the perspective of gender and feminism, to reconcile the biological and cultural understandings of old age. It reveals that there is no standard female or male experience and no single prototype of oldness in the modern Arabic novel, and that men and women manifest a multiplicity of identities, concerns, and experiences as they grow older.

Issues in Aging combines social, psychological, biological, and philosophical perspectives to present a multifaceted picture of aging. Novak illustrates both the problems and the opportunities that accompany older age. This text helps students understand the tremendous variability in aging and introduces them to careers working with older adults. This new edition reflects the continued changes in the way we age. The fourth edition has been updated to include emerging issues in aging. These include the prevalence of HIV/AIDs in later life, current research on mental potential in old age, the creation of age-friendly cities, and new options for end-of-life care. Each chapter begins with a set of learning objectives to guide students in their reading, and concludes with a list of main points, questions for discussion or study, suggested readings, and relevant web sites to consult. Each chapter also includes up-to-date charts and graphs as well as key terms to help students understand the issues presented. Break out boxes reveal the human side of aging through the stories of individuals in real life and in the media.

Uniquely bridging a gap in the gerontology literature between the biological and psychosocial aspects of aging, the second edition of this interdisciplinary text provides key updates on an abundance of cutting edge research, expands information on diversity issues in aging, and examines in greater depth the physiology of aging, theories of biological aging, and methodological issues. Instructors will also welcome the addition of an Instructor's Manual and PowerPoint slides. Written for upper-level undergraduate and graduate students, and invigorated by the addition of new coauthors, the text integrates findings in biology, psychology, and the social sciences to provide comprehensive, multidisciplinary coverage of the aging process. Included is key information on age-related changes and disease-related processes, the demography of the aging population worldwide, aging theories, and how to promote optimal aging. From a psychosocial perspective, the book examines mental health, stress and coping, spirituality, and caregiving in later years. Also included is crucial information on longitudinal design and statistics as they relate to aging research, promising new trends in gerotechnology, Green Houses, and information on health promotion programs. Real life examples throughout the text help students to understand practical applications of the material. New to the Third Edition: Abundant new cutting-edge research Expands information on diversity issues Updated theories of biological aging: microRNA, proteasomes, and gut microsomes Psychology of aging: how variability in responses to stress affect health and mortality, Blue Zones Aging and public policy: How the recent recession has affected poverty rates resulting in increases in mortality among poor, middle-aged whites Gerontechnology: The "internet of things," assistive devices, and the potential of robots Includes the research of new authors Instructor's Manual and PowerPoint slides Key Features: Integrates cutting-edge information on biological and psychosocial aspects of aging Examines age-related changes, disease-related processes, aging theories, and how to promote optimal aging Encompasses mental health, stress and coping, spirituality, and caregiving in later years Provides information on aging-related longitudinal design and statistics Covers promising new trends such as gerontechnology and Green Houses

Grandparents in Cultural Context gives a long overdue global view of the changing roles of grandparents. The eleven main chapters are by experts in the Americas, Europe and Russia, Asia, and Africa and the Middle East, and the editors integrate their chapters with previous writings on grandparenthood. Rather than technical or statistical research reports, each chapter provides a thought-provoking and comprehensive review of research, real-life case stories, cultural influences, and applied implications for grandparenthood across and within societies. Calling special attention to the roles of grandfathers and grandparenthood in societies previously un-represented in the literature, it provides several hundred new citations of work previously unavailable in English-language publications. Accessible to both scholars and students, it has several pedagogical features (e.g. web links, discussion questions) that make it useful as a text for upper-division undergraduate or graduate level classes in behavioral, social, and family sciences. It is relevant to psychology, gerontology, family studies, anthropology, family/comparative sociology, education, social work, gender studies, ethnic studies, psychiatry, and diversity and international studies programs. Practitioners, service providers, policymakers, and internationally minded grandparents will also enjoy this book.

Later-Life Social Support and Service Provision in Diverse and Vulnerable Populations offers current, multidisciplinary perspectives on social support and service provision to older Americans. The chapters trace how our understanding of social support among older adults has developed over the past 40 years and explore current gerontological research in the area. They consider how informal care arrangements articulate with formal long-term care policies and programs to provide support to the diverse population of older Americans. They also emphasize heterogeneity in the composition of support networks, particularly in relation to gender, sexual orientation, race/ethnicity, and immigrant status. Collectively, the chapters provide insight into the complexity of older adult's social support networks that can be used to improve the services provided to caregivers and care recipients as well as the policies that promote high-quality support to people of all ages who are in need of assistance.

This volume describes how well we maintain the knowledge we acquire throughout life. Research traditionally focuses on memory for events that are retained over short time periods that can be accommodated in experiments. This book, by contrast, uniquely describes the evolution of methods suitable for investigating memory of complex knowledge acquired over several years and retained during the entire life-span. The methods substitute statistical for experimental controls, and the investigations involve several hundred participants whose memory is tested up to 50 years after they acquired the knowledge in question. The book covers educational content, such as mathematics and foreign languages; knowledge acquired incidentally, such as the streets and buildings of the cities in which we live; and knowledge acquired through the media. Previously unpublished research on age-related access to knowledge is included. The analyses are based on the accessibility/availability ratio, a metric presented for the first time. This metric allows comparisons of the portion of available knowledge that can be recalled as a function of age, education and other individual differences, and as a function of the domain of knowledge in question. The ratio can be used to evaluate methods of instruction and methods of studying. It can also be used to evaluate memory development and to diagnose memory pathology. The volume will be of interest to researchers in human memory, developmental psychologists, gerontologists in academic and applied settings, and educators.

The essential guide to making sure you have a fabulous later life. You're likely to live longer than you think. Today's fifty-year olds could have an astounding 36 or more years of life. What's your dream life for your later years? When We're 64 is a friendly, practical guide to preparing for what could be the best years of your life - from the essentials on work and how to fund retirement, to volunteering, where to live and what kind of housing you'll need. It covers how to stay healthy - and still live a full life if you get a health condition - and reveals how your attitude to ageing could actually increase your lifespan. There are sections on relationships with family and friends, as well as caring for older relatives and how to tackle loneliness. Packed with expert advice and new evidence and tips on how to age well, this route map will help you plan and prepare for the future.

Increasingly, scholars from many disciplines have begun to incorporate various modalities from the humanities and arts - novels, films, artwork, and other forms of expression - to help connect students with the experience of aging in deeply meaningful and person-centered ways. This collection examines how these approaches are incorporated into gerontology and geriatrics education. Rather than focusing solely on measurable outcomes, such as changes in learning over time - which is the purview of empirical pedagogy - chapters focus on strategies for successfully incorporating a specific work into the classroom, descriptions of humanities and/or arts exercises with students or older adults, and other ways that explore how the humanities and arts can be applied successfully and meaningfully in educational settings. This book was originally published as a special issue of Geronotology & Geriatrics Education.

Ageing, Gender and Sexuality focuses on the experiences of older lesbian, gay and bisexual (LGB) individuals, in order to analyse how ageing, gender and sexuality intersect to produce particular inequalities relating to resources, recognition and representation in later life. The book adopts a feminist socio-legal perspective to propose that these inequalities are informed by and play out in relation to temporal, spatial and regulatory contexts. Discussing topics such as ageing sexual subjectivities, ageing kinship formations, classed trajectories and anticipated care futures, this book provides a new perspective on older individuals in same-sex relationships, including those who choose not to label their sexualities. Drawing upon recent empirical data, the book offers new theoretical approaches for understanding the intersectionality of ageing, gender and sexuality, as well as analysing the social policy implications of these findings. With an emphasis on the accounts of individuals who have experienced the dramatically changing socio-legal landscape for LGB people first-hand, this book is essential reading for students, scholars and policymakers working in the areas of: gender and sexuality studies; ageing studies and gerontology; gender, sexuality and law; equality and human rights; sociology; socio-legal studies; and social policy. Ageing, Gender and Sexuality won the Socio-Legal Studies Association (SLSA) Hart Prize for Early Career Academics for 2017.

Children and teenagers often struggle to cope with anger, and angry feelings can boil over into aggression and destructive behaviour. This updated and extended resource takes a different approach to anger, teaching children how to be angry effectively, rather than telling them not to be angry at all. Encouraging appropriate anger management through group work and tailored lessons, the book is also accompanied by downloadable additional resources demonstrating the activities and offering adaptations for parents. Suitable for use with children and teenagers aged 5 - 18, this engaging resource will help children to overcome self-destructive patterns of passive, aggressive, and passive aggressive behaviour.

Contemporary concerns about aging societies have stimulated interest in past ways of growing old, and whilst historians have investigated the experience of the aged, cultural representations of old age, and the phenomenon of demographic ageing, however the literature has been overwhelmingly western. This study reviews the world-wide literature on aging and seeks to move beyond received wisdom about attitudes and experiences running from the ancient world to the present.

Aging in World History will introduce students and general readers to historical ways of thinking about aging in two senses: the experience of individuals and the transformation of populations. The first section introduces theoretical concerns, understandings of "natural" or "traditional" ways of growing old, and diverse cultural prescriptions and representations. The second section covers key issues from the medieval to the early modern era. The third section looks at transitions to modernity, whilst the final part explores the contemporary world, before concluding with an overview of past, present and future.

This book focuses on the diverse interrelationships between aging and transnationality. It argues that the lives of older people are increasingly entangled in transnational contexts on the social as well as the cultural, economic and political levels. Within these contexts, older people both actively contribute to and are affected by border-crossing processes. In addition, while some may voluntarily opt for adding a transnational dimension to their lives, others may have less choice in the matter. Transnational aging, therefore, provides a critical lens on how older people shape, organize and cope with life in contexts that are no longer bound to the frame of a single nation-state. Accordingly, the book emphasizes the agency of older people as well as the personal and structural constraints of their situations. The chapters in this book reveal these aspects by approaching transnational aging from different methodological angles, such as ethnographic research, comparative studies, quantitative data, and policy and discourse analysis. Geographically, the chapters cover a wide range of countries in Africa, Asia, Europe, North and South America, such as Namibia, Thailand, Russia, Germany, the United States and Ecuador.

Giving voice to the lived experiences of people with dementia across the globe, including Australia, Canada, Sweden and the UK, this critical and evidence-based collection engages with the realities of life for people living with dementia at home and within their neighbourhoods. This insightful text addresses the fundamental social aspects of environment, including place attachment, belonging and connectivity. The chapters reveal the potential and expose the challenges for practitioners and researchers as dementia care shifts to a neighbourhood setting. The unique 'neighbourhood-centred' perspective provides an innovative guide for policy and practice and calls for a new place-based culture of care and support in the neighbourhood.

More than thirty-five years ago, a longitudinal study was established to research the health and well-being of older people living in an English city. Self and Meaning in the Lives of Older People provides a unique set of portraits of forty members of this group who were interviewed in depth from their later seventies onwards. Focusing on sense of self-esteem and, especially, of continued meaning in life following the loss of a spouse and onset of frailty, this book sensitively illustrates these persons' efforts to maintain independence, to continue to have a sense of belonging and to contribute to the lives of others. It examines both the psychological and the social resources needed to flourish in later life and draws attention to this generation's ability to benefit from strong family support and from belonging to a faith community. In conclusion, it questions whether future generations will be as resilient.

The complexity and diversity of families and aging has generated the necessity for research, policy, and program agendas that address emerging issues and needs for elderly Americans and their families. This volume is an effort towards that end - an effort towards fostering a different perspective at families and aging.

Decisions large and small play a fundamental role in shaping life course trajectories of health and well-being: decisions draw upon an individual's capacity for self-regulation and self-control, their ability to keep long-term goals in mind, and their willingness to place appropriate value on their future well-being. Aging and Decision Making addresses the specific cognitive and affective processes that account for age-related changes in decision making, targeting interventions to compensate for vulnerabilities and leverage strengths in the aging individual. This book focuses on four dominant approaches that characterize the current state of decision-making science and aging - neuroscience, behavioral mechanisms, competence models, and applied perspectives. Underscoring that choice is a ubiquitous component of everyday functioning, Aging and Decision Making examines the implications of how we invest our limited social, temporal, psychological, financial, and physical resources, and lays essential groundwork for the design of decision supportive interventions for adaptive aging that take into account individual capacities and context variables.

A Handbook of Geriatric Neuropsychology: Practice Essentials (Second Edition) brings together experts in the field to integrate the knowledge and skills needed to understand and treat older adults who are experiencing problems with memory and other thinking skills. With three new sections, including coverage of other conditions beyond neuropsychological disorders, special assessment contexts, and more on interventions and ethics, as well as multiple new chapters, and significant updates from the first edition, this book provides a strong foundation for clinicians, educators, and researchers invested in the wellbeing of older adults. The impact and experience of aging, like the practice of neuropsychology, evolves over time. Similarly, through advances in science and professional techniques, neuropsychological practice has continued to evolve. Neuropsychological evaluation remains the most effective method of diagnosing age-related cognitive decline, cognitive difficulties that result from psychological factors, and other related disorders, as well as determining how the various disorders impact functioning and quality of life. This book explores these areas and offers state-of-the-art assessment techniques to assess changes in cognition and behavior and to distinguish normal changes from neuropathology. This book is a go-to resource and key reference for psychologists who serve older adults with known or suspected cognitive problems, as well as those who are invested in promoting brain wellness. It provides much of the information needed to establish and improve foundational and functional competencies in geriatric neuropsychology and establish practices that are personally and professionally rewarding, all aimed at promoting the understanding and wellbeing of older adults.

A broad review of how nonprofits, businesses, and governments work together to tackle social problems Networks for Social Impact takes a systems approach to explain how and when networks make a social impact. Michelle Shumate and Katherine R. Cooper argue that network design and management is not a one-size-fits-all formula. Instead, they show that the type of social issue, the mechanism for social impact, environment, and resources available each determine appropriate choices. Drawing on research from public administration, psychology, business, network science, social work, and communication, this book synthesizes what we know about how to best design and manage networks. It includes illustrations from thirty original case studies which describe groups of organizations addressing issues such as gender-based violence, educational outcomes, senior care, veterans' services, mental health and wellness, and climate change. Additionally, the volume examines critical issues that leaders address in creating and managing networks, including social issue analysis, network governance, securing and managing funding, dealing with power and conflict, using data effectively, and managing change. Each chapter includes tools for network leaders to use to handle these issues. This book is neither an overly idealistic, pro-collaboration account of the benefits of network approaches, nor is it a critical view of these efforts. Instead, this clear and concise volume highlights the opportunities and challenges of networks.