October 20, 2023 • 29 mins
In this episode, I discuss the fascinating topic of subjective aging with Dr. Allyson Brothers, a leading expert from Colorado State University. In this episode, we unpack the concept of subjective aging and its profound impact on midlife well-being. Discover why our perceptions of aging matter, how they shape our health outcomes and the societal implications of fostering a positive view of aging. Dr. Brothers offers practical insights and actionable steps to cultivate a positive aging experience.
Resources
Recommended Book:
Breaking the Age Code How Your Beliefs About Aging Determine How Long and Well You Live
Changing the Narrative:
https://changingthenarrativeco.org/
Colorado State Healthy Aging Center
https://www.research.colostate.edu/healthyagingcenter/
Ryff Scales for Psychological Well-Being
Longitudinal effects of subjective aging on health and longevity: An updated metanalysis (2023)
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
intro here a minute, you know, would you.
Would you prefer I call youAllison or Ali on the podcast,
Ali, do you prefer Allison orAli?
Speaker 2 (00:11):
Ali's good.
Speaker 1 (00:11):
Okay, and brothers, is that correct?
Yep, okay, so I'm just gonnaread this.
I'll probably redo it, I'llprobably mess it up, but here's
just a feel for it.
Today, we're honored to have DrAllison Dr Allison Brothers,
who is an associate professor inthe Department of Human
Development and Family Studiesat Colorado State University.
Dr Brothers won a Nobel Prizefor her.
I'm just kidding.
(00:32):
Dr Brothers is a developmentalscientist who's research centers
on promoting healthy agingthroughout the lifespan.
I have really enjoyed readingher work on subjective aging and
it's just an excellent matchfor the for the mission of this
podcast.
I'm really grateful she'sagreed to join us.
Join us on this podcast for anenlightening conversation.
So welcome to the podcast, ali.
(00:54):
So happy you're with us.
Speaker 2 (00:55):
Thanks so much for having me.
Speaker 1 (00:57):
You are welcome.
Could you start by giving ourlisteners some background, some
personal background, and how youbecame interested in the topics
we'll be discussing today,particularly subjective aging?
Speaker 2 (01:07):
You bet my background's in psychology.
I have a bachelor's fromRoanoke College and a master's
from Penn State Harrisburgcampus and I've always been
interested in that intersectionof where psychological and
physical health meet.
And I just think it's sofascinating.
I've always been interested inunderstanding coping with
(01:30):
changes and with chronic illnessand had the pleasure and
opportunity to work in theneurology department at Penn
State College of Medicine,working with patients with ALS,
who are disease, andunderstanding how they and their
families navigated adevastating diagnosis and how
they did so gracefully.
(01:51):
Yes, and in the research thatwe did there, we focused on
caregiver support and cognitivechanges and quality of life and
all of these psychological andsocial variables that
accompanied physical health, andI just knew that was the type
of work that I really wanted todo, and it never occurred to me
(02:11):
to study aging before and when.
I found aging it's kind of.
This field is just.
It's perfect for being able toask those kinds of questions.
Speaker 1 (02:21):
Yeah, I love that because it really does have a
such a fascinating relationshipbetween your physical and your
psychological and just yourholistic well-being.
So I'm really fascinated withthis concept you've been writing
about, which is subjectiveaging.
So could you tell us a littlebit more about this and how it
might affect us in midlife?
Speaker 2 (02:41):
The power of attitudes.
So the field of subjectiveaging is actually this booming
area of research right now,which I've been so fortunate to
be a part of.
That was a big part of mydissertation work and all the
work that I did in graduateschool, so I studied with Dr
Monford Deal, who is a leadingresearcher in this field and
(03:02):
subjective aging.
The concept has been around fordecades and we've been able to
advance the measurement strategyaround it, and so what I'm
talking about with subjectiveaging is simply the perceptions
of aging, how people understandtheir own aging process and what
they think about it, how itcompares to what they thought it
would be, how they think otherpeople are aging and what aging
(03:23):
is supposed to be what theythink about old people in
general.
There's so many of thesesubjective aspects of how we
think about aging and it turnsout they're actually really
important and we can measurewhat type of impacts they have
later on.
Speaker 1 (03:39):
Tell us more about that.
How does it relate to ourwell-being?
Speaker 2 (03:43):
Yeah, so um One way, we published a study in 2020
that found that age stereotypespredict our self-perceptions of
aging and those, in turn,predict our physical and mental
health.
And so what we were able to showwith that study is that you
(04:04):
know some empirical evidence toshow support of some of the
theoretical thinking in thisarea, in that we internalize age
stereotypes so we think agingis the certain thing, and then
it becomes self-relevant.
At some point we turn ittowards ourselves and it
actually has measurable outcomeson how our physical health will
(04:24):
be even stronger than mentalhealth.
But both oh wow.
Speaker 1 (04:31):
So it's really really an important topic, and I'm
thankful that you've beenstudying it and being able to
share it with us today.
So what are some things thataffect our subjective well-being
in terms of you know why wemight have a positive, a lack or
perhaps a negative, andespecially for mid-lifers?
Speaker 2 (04:48):
Right, right, what are the antecedents of our
self-perceptions of aging?
It's such an interestingquestion.
I think the field has a lotmore work to do here.
Actually, there's some mixedevidence as far as does gender
matter, socioeconomic status, oryou know, we've done some
international work and it seemslike there is quite a bit of
individual variability thatwe're still trying to pin down.
(05:10):
But if you think about it, youthink about what a family has
experienced and how our earlierexperiences might shape how we
think about aging.
So imagine if you were a childand you were living with someone
with dementia and it wasn'tgoing well and there was some
aggression and paranoia and itwas maybe scary and you didn't
know how.
No one was there to help youinterpret what was happening.
Right, that can shapeexperiences later on.
(05:32):
You know, maybe there'sfamilies who are caring for an
older relative and they're ableto do it at home and avoid that
revolving door in the emergencyroom and, you know, maximize
time together as a family andenjoy the way that we care in
our families and are able to.
Age is so different for everyperson and every family, and so
(05:56):
I think those experiences reallycan impact what we think about
aging.
And then we also know agingstereotypes are just rampant in
all different realms.
You know, if you work in thetech field, you're more likely
to be seen as old, but beforeyou're even 40.
If you're, unfortunately,receiving healthcare, there's
(06:16):
documentation that evenwell-intentioned healthcare
providers which there's so manymay have more negative views
about aging, just simply becausethey're seeing the sick, older
adults in our population andmaybe not having as much
exposure and experience to theones that are healthy and
thriving.
So there's just there'snegative aging stereotypes that
are rampant.
I mean, there's depends on what.
(06:36):
Maybe who will send youbirthday cards, right?
Are they sending you thebirthday cards that you can't
control your body anymore andyou won't remember anything?
And that's what's aging is.
You know these stereotypes?
That's still kind of sociallyacceptable to make fun of aging
and older people and theremaining um isms.
That's kind of still allowed tohave humor in our society at
this point.
Speaker 1 (06:57):
That's exactly right.
That's exactly right and I lovethat your work is kind of
advancing that and you've chosento spoke with me, because
that's one of the things I liketo do in here is change that
narrative, like let's thinkabout this you know it is
subjective and think about themessages that we are receiving.
So just for my own kind ofclarifying we may have to edit
this out, ali, but I just wantto make sure I'm with you.
It seems like there's aninternal piece in how you you
(07:21):
know respond to signs thatyou're aging.
You know you may be gettingmore gray hairs or you may be
seeing, you know.
You know, maybe struck as fromsomething so long ago.
You somebody doesn't know whatPac-Man is, for example.
You know, and then also you'rereceiving it.
You know there are other peoplethat are putting that
perception on you.
So are you saying that it'sit's both, that we are working
(07:42):
on both ends of that?
Speaker 2 (07:44):
That's exactly right.
So more of my research hasfocused on the former.
So the construct that I've beeninvolved in creating a
measurement for and assessing indifferent cultures, and it's
called awareness of age relatedchange, and it's simply that how
do we become aware that we'regrowing older?
And we've measured it acrossfive different domains.
(08:04):
So how do you feel about aging?
And cognitive domain versusphysical, versus leisure, versus
family and interpersonal, andso so those perceptions matter,
but certainly they're influencedby the way you're treated, so
the way that you may perceive itas discrimination or
microaggressions, or you mightnot even notice it.
most people don't even notice itand it's just messages, and I
(08:26):
think one of the harms comeswhen we don't question what
these messages are.
Speaker 1 (08:31):
Yeah, we just accept what we're hearing or we accept
how society, what society hastold us about it, and I could
see where that would really makea difference on kind of I would
, I would guess your resiliencein terms of aging or your
outlook on aging.
Speaker 2 (08:46):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, we've definitely been able to
link these.
And so, talking about I teach acourse on resilience I'm more
in a teaching focused worldthese days, but I'm still
somewhat involved in theresearch as well but I teach a
course on resilience.
And, yeah, when we get to thelater part of the lifespan, and
talking about resilience, we'retalking about some of these
psychological variables that canhelp make a huge difference.
(09:08):
And so and our research hasshown that the perception of age
related gains.
So I was talking about how wemeasure the perceptions of aging
across these five differentdomains social versus cognitive
versus physical, et cetera.
We also measure gains andlosses, so perceived gains and
losses.
So, because we're acknowledginghow complex and multifaceted
subjections, subjectiveexperiences of aging are right,
(09:30):
you might feel old in the workrealm, but young in the family
or the leisure maybe youryoungest person on the tennis
court in the group that you playwith, or whatever, and so we
recognize that there's gains andlosses across all of these
domains as well, and so peoplewho report more gains we're
actually finding a offeringeffect where that can offset the
negative impact of stereotypesand self-perceptions of aging on
(09:53):
health.
So I think for me that's thebuffering effect is really
fascinating.
Speaker 1 (09:59):
That is so interesting.
You know I'm blown away talkingto people like you about kind
of the midlife experience andthat's a theme that's came up is
that it's both a theme ofgrowth and decline and in some
past episodes we've discussedhow keeping those in balance
like it can be easy to focus onone side or the other and I
(10:20):
think it's easier to focus onmaybe the negative component of
it.
So you know you talked aboutresilience and I know, you know
I'm kind of skipping a littlebit with you here, ali, I know
I'll edit that out.
But you know you talked aboutthere being some factors related
to resilience, so I would loveto hear more about some of those
things that you know from theresearch that we can do to be
(10:41):
more resilient as it relates toour subjective experience of
aging.
Speaker 2 (10:45):
Yeah, yeah.
So I think one of the things isjust kind of understanding
midlife as its own period oflife that's full of kind of.
These go back and forth betweenstability and transition.
Stability, transitionthroughout midlife right,
there's the the career or thefamily, or the partnerships, or
(11:07):
the loss of partnerships, andthe stability decline, right.
Or you know transition.
And so just acknowledging thattransitions are hard for you
know from my two year oldstruggles with transitions and
all the way up to transitioninginto a long term care facility
throughout our lives like atransition puberty, menopause,
like transitions are never easy,and so I think, giving
(11:27):
ourselves a little bit of gracewhen we're in those times and
then also thinking about thisperiod of development that a lot
of people never really thoughtabout before was kind of like,
yeah, you develop until you're18, you're an adult, and then
you get old and you die, right,and so I think we really can
take back this period of ourlives.
I'm almost 42, you know I'mright here with your
(11:47):
listenership and I think we cantake back this period of our
lives and kind of try torecreate what it is and find it
as a time of opportunity andgrowth and you know kind of what
I was saying earlier.
When we're able to do that,that can act as a pretty strong
protective factor.
But yeah, coping, coping skillsactually tend to get better as
(12:07):
we get older anyway.
So that's one thing that we canpractice and try and find
better ways of doing it rightDitching the alcohol, coping and
finding the problem based andthe social support and the
emotional support and thefinding of those things that
work we can get.
the more practice we have, thebetter we can get at them, if we
allow ourselves to them.
Speaker 1 (12:27):
Hmm, I think it's so interesting your
conceptualization of domains,because I'm guessing it's likely
that people have some variancewithin those.
You know, like some might bereally a strength, some might
really be a difficulty.
You know, and I don't knowwhere I'm going with this.
(12:47):
I think I would imagine there'ssome wisdom in, if you have a
strength, really building on itand capitalizing it, because it
probably kind of balances outsome of those negative areas or
helps you strengthen thosenarrative areas.
Do you see that at all?
Speaker 2 (13:04):
I think so I think that's really important and I
think, as we get to kind of justdevelopmentally, as we get to
midlife, one of the things thatpeople say from that, we did all
the focus groups and interviewsand diary studies when we were
creating this awareness of agerelated change scale, to say
what are these items that reallyresonate with people?
But people report feeling morethemselves, so they know
themselves better, they feellike they have permission to be
(13:27):
themselves more and I thinkthat's really important and can
help Right.
So it kind of this realizationthat I'm at a certain age I can
just be who I am now and I don'tknow why I couldn't before but
now I can and it's kind of anice shift.
Speaker 1 (13:43):
Yeah.
Yeah, that really resonateswith me and some of my
discussions.
It's kind of going from like asocially constructed person like
you kind of have taken in theworld, but now in midlife you
kind of have that chance todetermine your kind of internal
compass in terms of what do Ibelieve in, what do I value, how
(14:05):
do I want to do things, notnecessarily how do I think
somebody else wants me to livemy life, and so that's really, I
think, could be really valuablein this in terms of like just
that aging experience, like hey,it's okay, I'm not as worried
about what society says or whatother people are being.
I have my own internal compassabout the life I'm living.
Speaker 2 (14:24):
I think you're spot on and I think that's one of
those things.
So if you would ask somebodyoff the street of what they
think about aging, they're goingto start with all the you know,
the frailty and the declinesand thinking a lot more in the
physical realm.
But I think if we can getpeople to really realize that
there are people do report a lotof benefits to aging and if we
can start to conceptualize them,that's where the subjective
(14:45):
experiences of gains really comein, and the more we notice
those, the more protective theyseem to be.
So that's one people also tendto report and we find from the
research that emotionalwell-being tends to get better,
even in the face of reallysevere losses the loss of a
lifetime spouse, the loss ofsome major physical functioning.
(15:07):
People report being happier andthat is an ongoing finding in
the research that this field isgrappling with and coming to
find out that it's real, it'snot just kind of this strange
finding, but it keeps beingreplicated and of course there's
individual difference,individual variability across
(15:27):
everything.
That's what makes us humans.
But in general, there's a lotof benefits that people are
reporting and the funny thingabout studying aging is you
haven't been there yet, right?
It takes a lot of talking topeople and listening and
understanding many, manydifferent types of experiences.
Speaker 1 (15:45):
I love hearing that because I really do think that's
not the narrative.
The narrative is oh, it'sdecline.
You're getting grazed, you havethis midlife crisis, but it's
not that it does not have to bethat.
Like you said, midlife ischallenging and there are lots
of different individualexperiences, but we've grown an
experience.
We've grown in Skills, we'vegrown in our emotional
(16:07):
well-being, hopefully, and wecan be more intentional about
what we know brings us joy andin meaning.
So I just really love hearingthat.
So could you tell us a littlebit more?
If you haven't?
I know you've given ussomething, but are there more
practical steps that you couldtell us about how to cultivate a
positive, subjective agingexperience?
Speaker 2 (16:27):
Yeah, yeah, absolutely.
I think one of the mostimportant things is checking our
biases.
So you know, a lot of these areimplicit and we don't even
notice.
I love, I love.
I'm still uncovering kind ofmessages about older people that
I haven't thought of yet, andso you know some just little
things right, like, like youknow, older people are supposed
(16:48):
to be less physically active.
There's the recliner chair, therocking chair or Not.
You're supposed to be settingyour ways, or you're supposed to
not want to try new foods, oryeah you know, supposed to be
resistant and certainly again,that individual variability
thing.
but I think if you can checkthat assumption and say, well,
maybe some older people are thatway, that are people that I
knew, but maybe I don't want tobe that way, I hope I'm still
(17:09):
trying new foods and Listening,giving new music a chance and
not writing it off when I'm like92, you know.
I hope that I can keep thismessage of openness as I
navigate my life and and checkthose biases and not let them
determine who I'm going to be.
Speaker 1 (17:25):
so I think that's.
Speaker 2 (17:27):
One thing and and you know those the birthday cards
and the even.
I mean, I think one of the mostimportant things you can do If
you're out there and you'veheard somebody recently talk
about a senior moment likesquash, that let's get rid of
this.
Speaker 1 (17:41):
Hmm.
Speaker 2 (17:42):
I think he's since I was like 18, I don't know.
It wasn't due to age then it'sprobably not now.
Speaker 1 (17:49):
That's right.
That's right.
I heard somebody else say youknow like we have, you know,
kind of difficult times acrossour lifespan, but when it's a
midlife, we almost aresocialized like, oh, it's a
midlife crisis.
You know like these thingshappen across and to give us
great ourselves grace and Ithink that's a big part of what
I'm learning from this podcastis to really question the things
that I'm hearing about myselfand my generation and and you
(18:12):
know, and decide what for myself, what I want to be, how I want
this to be, and not accept likethat's how it has to be, even
though I haven't been there.
Well, I get a forge, my ownpath, right.
Speaker 2 (18:22):
I think so and I think it's worth questioning and
maybe maybe there's somethingthat happened that it is due to
age.
But I think a lot of times isnot going to be and there is
good research that show.
That show is that it's kind ofan age attribution bias happens.
You know, you could be like ohwell, I, you know, went for my
hike and my my right knee isjust an excruciating pain.
It's just because I'm gettingold.
(18:43):
Well, your left knee is thesame age.
It's not.
Maybe not because of age.
There's maybe something wrongand having making these age
attributions can actually getpeople to delay treatment or
skip it all together and then itcan get worse.
Speaker 1 (18:57):
Yeah, yeah, exactly One thing I wanted to give you
the chance to talk about arekind of the societal
implications of subjective aging.
You've mentioned some of that,but do you have more that you
want to say about?
About that?
Speaker 2 (19:08):
I mean, I think, health on a pretty wide range.
So we can't have thisconversation and not talk about
Becca Levy, who's a one of theleading researchers in this
field, who has shown so manyOutcomes linked to negative
attitudes towards aging andnegative beliefs, but one of the
most cited ones that she foundand reported was seven and a
half year longevity difference,so people who report more
(19:31):
positive use of aging may liveseven and a half years longer.
On that, and that is a prettysignificant chunk of time.
So I mean, of course we want tomake sure we have those years,
as it's healthy, but that's apretty, pretty long chunk of
time.
But so I think, societally, thereduction of negative age
stereotypes and negative focuson experiences of personal aging
(19:54):
I mean the research has tied tohealth, is a lot of this name
of you right.
So cardiac event,hospitalization, depressive
symptoms, cognitive decline,even neural neuropathology
associated with Alzheimer'sdisease and this one's
interesting linked to healthbehaviors.
So people who have morepositive views on aging engage
(20:15):
in more positive healthbehaviors, right, they go to the
doctor, they wear theirseatbelts, they may quit smoking
, that kind of a thing.
So so it's kind of like takingan active part in feeling like
you have some control over theaging process.
So I think if we can kind ofship this on a societal level, I
think maybe we can see betterhealth across the board, which
would be pretty huge.
Speaker 1 (20:34):
Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 2 (20:35):
Yeah exactly.
Speaker 1 (20:37):
I mean, we can do it I joke about this, I say it too
often.
My fault on this podcast is Ikind of get overly optimistic,
but I want to do it, we can tochange that narrative.
You are speaking from a sciencebased perspective that you know
.
Subjective aging makes adifference, both at a societal
level and an individual level,and we don't need to accept
(20:59):
those stereotypes anddifficulties that we've had in
the past.
You know, I heard you say someof the the negative associations
, and earlier you mentioned thatthere are a lot of positive
things to aging to.
Would you just, off the top ofyour head, name some of those,
just to kind of balance it out,because I think those would be
kind of the types of things tohave in our minds and in our
conversations about.
(21:19):
Yeah, aging can be difficult,all ages of life are difficult,
but here are some of thepositive things about this as
well.
What would you say about that?
Speaker 2 (21:28):
yes, the positive changes that come with aging
that we know people report, yeah.
So I think the improvement inrelationship quality, social
relationships kind of get bettersocial skills as we have more
practice, a sense of knowingourselves better and maybe being
able to be a bit more true toourselves than when we were
(21:50):
younger.
Speaker 1 (21:51):
For sure.
Speaker 2 (21:52):
Better emotional regulation, better coping skills
, more engagement in healthbehaviors.
In general, people do tend totake better care of themselves
as they get older.
Speaker 1 (22:04):
That's right.
That's right, that's right.
And we are kind of thatsandwich generation, you know.
So sometimes we're taking morecaregivers for our parents and
or caregivers for our children.
But our children are becomingmore independent too.
So I think sometimes we mighthave more independence at this
age as well for those developingthe kind of those resilience
behaviors and putting those inour routine.
Speaker 2 (22:25):
Yes, right.
So what you mentioned isdefinitely one of the known
stressors of midlife is justthat the competing roles and
responsibilities, that there'smore people need you than ever
before.
You may be at the peak ofmanaging things at work and home
and family and young ones andolder family members, and
neighborhoods and councils andboards and all of it.
(22:46):
You know there's, there's andthat can be, that can be a
stressor.
Speaker 1 (22:51):
There's so much great knowledge about this topic from
you, ali.
I know it's an emerging areaand you've been writing about
this a lot, but you know howwould you advise us to use this
knowledge to live healthier,more fulfilling lives?
Speaker 2 (23:05):
Yeah, thanks for asking.
I mean, I think one of thethings that we can do is find
and be mentors with people ofall ages.
So I've heard the advice onetime that you should have people
, friends like actual friends,who are older than you and
younger than you, right, so thatyou can always be learning from
(23:25):
somebody and always be teachingsomebody what you've learned,
right.
Speaker 1 (23:27):
Oh, I love that.
Speaker 2 (23:28):
In our society we kind of tend to be age
segregated 55 plus communities.
Maybe it's age segregated bychoice, right, but I'm all a fan
of more integrated agecommunities.
So, you can learn from eachother, rely on each other, teach
each other what we know, sharestrengths and you know, watch my
kid for an hour.
I can grab your groceries whileI'm at the store.
(23:50):
You know those kinds ofintertwined neighborhoods and
communities that I think we'vemoved away from.
Speaker 1 (23:56):
I love that You're so right.
It seems that's the type ofadvice that, like once you hear
it, you're like, yeah, thatmakes so much sense?
Speaker 2 (24:04):
Yeah, I don't do it.
Speaker 1 (24:06):
You know that's such a great recipe because we can
learn from those who have beenahead of us that we may maybe
doing the things that we'regoing to be encountering.
And yet it is a reallysatisfying time in midlife to be
mentoring people because wehave been through some things
and it helps us realize I knowfor me it helps me realize that
I have learned a few tricks thatI have some skills to share,
(24:27):
you know, and it's just really afulfilling thing.
Yeah, I love that.
Speaker 2 (24:31):
I think it's important to be present and
visible in those roles too thatyou know our older neighbors
should be mentoring us and weshould have.
You know there's a lot it's.
Social media is hard.
It can go either way, right,there can be.
There's some tendency to focuson the super-agers and the
bodybuilders and the you knowpeople who probably the general
(24:53):
public is not going to thatlevel of functioning.
But I think we need morerealistic examples and mentors
of what it looks like to growold in a way that I don't know.
It's just well and taking careof each other and taking care of
ourselves and not limiting whatwe're doing based on what we
expect aging to be Allie.
Speaker 1 (25:15):
I'm just doing a quick cut to just say well, this
is amazing stuff, I think, forme on our outline, I'm getting
to the conclusion.
Speaker 2 (25:24):
Is that?
Speaker 1 (25:24):
kind of what have you been through some of the stuff
on your 1-3-3 so far?
Yeah, I think.
Speaker 2 (25:27):
I got through everything I wanted to.
Speaker 1 (25:29):
Okay, I wanted to, just can I?
I want to just ask if for a fewminutes I just want to ask you
like kind of my ownclarifications, perhaps you know
, and it may be something thatwe don't keep or anything like
that, and then go into thoseconclusion questions.
So this is kind of me justbeing curious, and so I'm
(25:50):
curious as I kind ofconceptualize this about those
domains cognitive, what werethey?
Speaker 2 (25:58):
again, cognitive Physical functioning and health,
cognitive, interpersonal,social cognitive and social
emotional, so kind of how werelate socially and emotionally
with others.
And then leisure and lifestyle.
Speaker 1 (26:15):
Okay, so those are the main domains that you've
been measuring as far as itrelates to aging and life
satisfaction.
Is that accurate?
Speaker 2 (26:23):
Yes.
Okay so yeah, so we didn't havea on our measure, we didn't
have a workplace, one, ah, asfar as I know, there's a
stereotype measure thatcolleagues in Germany created
does.
Speaker 1 (26:36):
Yeah, so why?
I kind of ask that is, I'minterested in you know how
that's useful or how that getsselected?
Because as I'm hearing thoseand thinking about those, those
seem to be like if we were goingto try to be clear about what's
important in lives andwell-being, like those would be
five domains to focus on,developing and be aware of those
(27:02):
.
Like I think it's one thing tosay I'm going to be happy and
helpful and whatever today, butreally what's important to me,
what's important for mylong-term well-being, Does those
domains relate to that?
Speaker 2 (27:13):
So somewhat, they sure do.
There's probably a more helpfulscale of what you're what you
might be looking for.
Dr Carol Riff had created thepsychological well-being scales
SPWE scales for psychologicalwell-being, and there's six
facets to that and they are moreon the.
(27:34):
So if there's not a physicalone, they're more kind of
individual personality orpsychological characteristics.
So, purpose growth.
Speaker 1 (27:48):
Yeah, yeah, that makes sense.
So this is really just kind offor me.
How did you select those, youknow?
How did you select the five?
Speaker 2 (27:55):
that you got.
How did?
Speaker 1 (27:55):
those make the list, or what stands out about those?
Speaker 2 (27:57):
Where do these come from?
Yeah, so, dr Riff, it's kind oflike her whole career of
research that these, so you knowkind ofa combination of
qualitative and quantitativework of you know, looking at
what the interviews and thetranscripts say and then doing
some data analyses as well andsome factor analysis to
(28:19):
establish the six distinctscales from one.
Speaker 1 (28:22):
Okay, so, yeah, she okay Cool.
So she took all that data anddetermined that those are the
five primary domains to measureand there's a.
Speaker 2 (28:32):
I don't know if it's in the public domain or not.
You'd be able to find it as anacademic for sure.
But yeah you can take it andsee how you can kind of see your
profile and how you were on thedifferent scales and so the
idea there, and we use hermeasure as an outcome in a lot
of our research where we'repredicting predicting well-being
based- on perceptions of agingand we make a distinction.
(28:54):
You know her scales focus a lotmore on eudaimonic well-being
versus hedonistic right.
So, it's not the like you know,bubble bath, chocolate, great
glass of wine, kind of feelinggood stuff, happiness maybe but
it's more like deep sadness.
You might not be smiling allthe time, you might not feel
happy, but you feel fulfilledand satisfied.
Speaker 1 (29:14):
Yes, very cool.
All right, that satisfies mycuriosity.
Personally, that's part of thebenefits of this job.
Speaker 2 (29:19):
I need your time wisely, but very cool.
Speaker 1 (29:25):
All right, so we'll move to the last section here.
Oh, this is such great, greatinformation, allie.
This is a fascinating topic anda useful practical one as well
too.
So I'm curious to somebodywho's really studied this, you
know, what are some of yourfinal thoughts you'd like to
leave our listeners with aboutsubjective aging and midlife.
Speaker 2 (29:45):
Yeah, I think there's a lot.
I mean, one of the cool thingsabout attitudes is that they're
under our control, they're freeto change right, we don't have
to pay any money, and just takesa little effort.
And I think starting to checkour biases and expectations of
aging earlier on, like, I think,in midlife, we're doing
ourselves a real favor toprevent those extra decades from
(30:09):
just having internalizedstereotypes over time that
really get under our skin andreally have a stronger effect.
So I think that checking ourbiases and really just kind of
thinking about is this aging,this is how I want aging to be,
and realizing that there's lotsof different possibilities there
is important.
I think that you know I've beentalking about positive views on
(30:30):
aging and I always like toclarify here I'm not saying that
aging is easy and perfect andhappy all the time.
There are some seriouschallenges, real, real difficult
aspects, and for some peoplemore than others, but I don't
think it's ever easy, and so Ithink what I'm advocating here,
for which I really want to makeclear, is that even people who
(30:52):
have been are devastating thingsare able to also find positive
aspects of their life andpositive aspects of growing
older and new opportunities andand it can maybe help offset
some of the negative, but it'snot.
Instead, it's not denying, it'snot replacing.
Speaker 1 (31:11):
Right, that makes total sense.
Yeah, yeah, I know I could goon and on here.
I'm sure you could.
You know kind of along thatvein.
You know, like what are someresources?
If people are wanting to findout more, what would you
recommend if people want to kindof go more in depth on this?
Speaker 2 (31:30):
Yeah, I've been laughing because you have been
using this phrase changing thenarrative.
And that's actually anorganization out of Denver, an
hour down the road from me, andtheir entire purpose is to
eradicate ageism.
So, changing the narrative,you're already there, you
shouldn't, oh awesome, checkthem out.
They have a fantastic websitewith lots of great newsletter,
(31:51):
lots of great resources andevents that are remote.
You can tune into from anywhere, and they've had they've done
some really creative things,like they've had a birthday card
competition where local artistscan submit positive, aging
message birthday cards and, youknow, actually win a cash award
and then they sell them andeverything.
Speaker 1 (32:11):
So that is so cool.
Yeah, that sounds like theperfect answer as you might
guess I would say, after sayingthat over and over here I will
definitely check that out.
I might have to get a poster inmy room or something.
Oh, very cool.
Speaker 2 (32:28):
That's a good resources there.
I'll just put in a plug for ourCenter for Healthy Aging here
at Colorado State University.
There's some really greatresources and tons of good
research talks and things.
If you want to just find outmore about aging in general not
necessarily attitudes towardsaging, but like information and
the science there's so much goodresearch going on in lots of
(32:48):
different fields Biomedical,actually veterinary.
There's comparative medicinetype stuff, psychology,
sociology, design all kinds offields can come to aging
business, all kinds of things.
So some really neat talks there.
Bec Alevi I mentioned as aresearcher who's published all
(33:08):
of this great academic work, butshe just came out with a book
last year called Breaking theAge Code, where she's talking
about this exact topic and hassome nice strategies in there
and some neat stories throughouther career.
Yeah, and then there's there.
I mean, there's a lot ofacademic work too.
So if you're interested insearching for things in
(33:31):
development, developmentalscience, human development
psychology we have a new metaanalysis coming out, or that
just came out this year,updating so I think it was
talking earlier on about howthis field is growing so fast.
We did a meta analysis in 2014and there were gosh less than 20
studies that we were able toinclude, and now there's over
(33:53):
100 in this update oh my gosh 10years later.
Speaker 1 (33:55):
So we're not really wow, really add it must.
That really adds to the what weknow about it, the
effectiveness, the confidence wecan have in this kind of
construct, and wow, that'sincredible.
I'll make sure to get the somelinks from you too after this
show and put them in thedescription so listeners can
find those even easier.
So so, yeah, allie, this is areally important topic to our
(34:17):
listeners and to society ingeneral, and so, again, I just
want to say thank you for allthat you've done on this, to
being and to being too, and forbeing willing to come on this
kind of you know out therepodcast on midlifers.
It's just really reallyappreciated and I think it's
going to help a lot of people.
So thank you so much for whatyou're doing and thank you for
(34:38):
joining us today.
Speaker 2 (34:39):
Thanks for giving it some space.
I love talking about it and I'mglad you find it as interesting
as I do.
Speaker 1 (34:44):
So Cool, I'll stop there and just say awesome,
allie, thank you, and justmaking sure, yeah, you got you.
intro here a minute, you know, would you.
Would you prefer I call youAllison or Ali on the podcast,
Ali, do you prefer Allison orAli?
Speaker 2 (00:11):
Ali's good.
Speaker 1 (00:11):
Okay, and brothers, is that correct?
Yep, okay, so I'm just gonnaread this.
I'll probably redo it, I'llprobably mess it up, but here's
just a feel for it.
Today, we're honored to have DrAllison Dr Allison Brothers,
who is an associate professor inthe Department of Human
Development and Family Studiesat Colorado State University.
Dr Brothers won a Nobel Prizefor her.
I'm just kidding.
(00:32):
Dr Brothers is a developmentalscientist who's research centers
on promoting healthy agingthroughout the lifespan.
I have really enjoyed readingher work on subjective aging and
it's just an excellent matchfor the for the mission of this
podcast.
I'm really grateful she'sagreed to join us.
Join us on this podcast for anenlightening conversation.
So welcome to the podcast, ali.
(00:54):
So happy you're with us.
Speaker 2 (00:55):
Thanks so much for having me.
Speaker 1 (00:57):
You are welcome.
Could you start by giving ourlisteners some background, some
personal background, and how youbecame interested in the topics
we'll be discussing today,particularly subjective aging?
Speaker 2 (01:07):
You bet my background's in psychology.
I have a bachelor's fromRoanoke College and a master's
from Penn State Harrisburgcampus and I've always been
interested in that intersectionof where psychological and
physical health meet.
And I just think it's sofascinating.
I've always been interested inunderstanding coping with
(01:30):
changes and with chronic illnessand had the pleasure and
opportunity to work in theneurology department at Penn
State College of Medicine,working with patients with ALS,
who are disease, andunderstanding how they and their
families navigated adevastating diagnosis and how
they did so gracefully.
(01:51):
Yes, and in the research thatwe did there, we focused on
caregiver support and cognitivechanges and quality of life and
all of these psychological andsocial variables that
accompanied physical health, andI just knew that was the type
of work that I really wanted todo, and it never occurred to me
(02:11):
to study aging before and when.
I found aging it's kind of.
This field is just.
It's perfect for being able toask those kinds of questions.
Speaker 1 (02:21):
Yeah, I love that because it really does have a
such a fascinating relationshipbetween your physical and your
psychological and just yourholistic well-being.
So I'm really fascinated withthis concept you've been writing
about, which is subjectiveaging.
So could you tell us a littlebit more about this and how it
might affect us in midlife?
Speaker 2 (02:41):
The power of attitudes.
So the field of subjectiveaging is actually this booming
area of research right now,which I've been so fortunate to
be a part of.
That was a big part of mydissertation work and all the
work that I did in graduateschool, so I studied with Dr
Monford Deal, who is a leadingresearcher in this field and
(03:02):
subjective aging.
The concept has been around fordecades and we've been able to
advance the measurement strategyaround it, and so what I'm
talking about with subjectiveaging is simply the perceptions
of aging, how people understandtheir own aging process and what
they think about it, how itcompares to what they thought it
would be, how they think otherpeople are aging and what aging
(03:23):
is supposed to be what theythink about old people in
general.
There's so many of thesesubjective aspects of how we
think about aging and it turnsout they're actually really
important and we can measurewhat type of impacts they have
later on.
Speaker 1 (03:39):
Tell us more about that.
How does it relate to ourwell-being?
Speaker 2 (03:43):
Yeah, so um One way, we published a study in 2020
that found that age stereotypespredict our self-perceptions of
aging and those, in turn,predict our physical and mental
health.
And so what we were able to showwith that study is that you
(04:04):
know some empirical evidence toshow support of some of the
theoretical thinking in thisarea, in that we internalize age
stereotypes so we think agingis the certain thing, and then
it becomes self-relevant.
At some point we turn ittowards ourselves and it
actually has measurable outcomeson how our physical health will
(04:24):
be even stronger than mentalhealth.
But both oh wow.
Speaker 1 (04:31):
So it's really really an important topic, and I'm
thankful that you've beenstudying it and being able to
share it with us today.
So what are some things thataffect our subjective well-being
in terms of you know why wemight have a positive, a lack or
perhaps a negative, andespecially for mid-lifers?
Speaker 2 (04:48):
Right, right, what are the antecedents of our
self-perceptions of aging?
It's such an interestingquestion.
I think the field has a lotmore work to do here.
Actually, there's some mixedevidence as far as does gender
matter, socioeconomic status, oryou know, we've done some
international work and it seemslike there is quite a bit of
individual variability thatwe're still trying to pin down.
(05:10):
But if you think about it, youthink about what a family has
experienced and how our earlierexperiences might shape how we
think about aging.
So imagine if you were a childand you were living with someone
with dementia and it wasn'tgoing well and there was some
aggression and paranoia and itwas maybe scary and you didn't
know how.
No one was there to help youinterpret what was happening.
Right, that can shapeexperiences later on.
(05:32):
You know, maybe there'sfamilies who are caring for an
older relative and they're ableto do it at home and avoid that
revolving door in the emergencyroom and, you know, maximize
time together as a family andenjoy the way that we care in
our families and are able to.
Age is so different for everyperson and every family, and so
(05:56):
I think those experiences reallycan impact what we think about
aging.
And then we also know agingstereotypes are just rampant in
all different realms.
You know, if you work in thetech field, you're more likely
to be seen as old, but beforeyou're even 40.
If you're, unfortunately,receiving healthcare, there's
(06:16):
documentation that evenwell-intentioned healthcare
providers which there's so manymay have more negative views
about aging, just simply becausethey're seeing the sick, older
adults in our population andmaybe not having as much
exposure and experience to theones that are healthy and
thriving.
So there's just there'snegative aging stereotypes that
are rampant.
I mean, there's depends on what.
(06:36):
Maybe who will send youbirthday cards, right?
Are they sending you thebirthday cards that you can't
control your body anymore andyou won't remember anything?
And that's what's aging is.
You know these stereotypes?
That's still kind of sociallyacceptable to make fun of aging
and older people and theremaining um isms.
That's kind of still allowed tohave humor in our society at
this point.
Speaker 1 (06:57):
That's exactly right.
That's exactly right and I lovethat your work is kind of
advancing that and you've chosento spoke with me, because
that's one of the things I liketo do in here is change that
narrative, like let's thinkabout this you know it is
subjective and think about themessages that we are receiving.
So just for my own kind ofclarifying we may have to edit
this out, ali, but I just wantto make sure I'm with you.
It seems like there's aninternal piece in how you you
(07:21):
know respond to signs thatyou're aging.
You know you may be gettingmore gray hairs or you may be
seeing, you know.
You know, maybe struck as fromsomething so long ago.
You somebody doesn't know whatPac-Man is, for example.
You know, and then also you'rereceiving it.
You know there are other peoplethat are putting that
perception on you.
So are you saying that it'sit's both, that we are working
(07:42):
on both ends of that?
Speaker 2 (07:44):
That's exactly right.
So more of my research hasfocused on the former.
So the construct that I've beeninvolved in creating a
measurement for and assessing indifferent cultures, and it's
called awareness of age relatedchange, and it's simply that how
do we become aware that we'regrowing older?
And we've measured it acrossfive different domains.
(08:04):
So how do you feel about aging?
And cognitive domain versusphysical, versus leisure, versus
family and interpersonal, andso so those perceptions matter,
but certainly they're influencedby the way you're treated, so
the way that you may perceive itas discrimination or
microaggressions, or you mightnot even notice it.
most people don't even notice itand it's just messages, and I
(08:26):
think one of the harms comeswhen we don't question what
these messages are.
Speaker 1 (08:31):
Yeah, we just accept what we're hearing or we accept
how society, what society hastold us about it, and I could
see where that would really makea difference on kind of I would
, I would guess your resiliencein terms of aging or your
outlook on aging.
Speaker 2 (08:46):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, we've definitely been able to
link these.
And so, talking about I teach acourse on resilience I'm more
in a teaching focused worldthese days, but I'm still
somewhat involved in theresearch as well but I teach a
course on resilience.
And, yeah, when we get to thelater part of the lifespan, and
talking about resilience, we'retalking about some of these
psychological variables that canhelp make a huge difference.
(09:08):
And so and our research hasshown that the perception of age
related gains.
So I was talking about how wemeasure the perceptions of aging
across these five differentdomains social versus cognitive
versus physical, et cetera.
We also measure gains andlosses, so perceived gains and
losses.
So, because we're acknowledginghow complex and multifaceted
subjections, subjectiveexperiences of aging are right,
(09:30):
you might feel old in the workrealm, but young in the family
or the leisure maybe youryoungest person on the tennis
court in the group that you playwith, or whatever, and so we
recognize that there's gains andlosses across all of these
domains as well, and so peoplewho report more gains we're
actually finding a offeringeffect where that can offset the
negative impact of stereotypesand self-perceptions of aging on
(09:53):
health.
So I think for me that's thebuffering effect is really
fascinating.
Speaker 1 (09:59):
That is so interesting.
You know I'm blown away talkingto people like you about kind
of the midlife experience andthat's a theme that's came up is
that it's both a theme ofgrowth and decline and in some
past episodes we've discussedhow keeping those in balance
like it can be easy to focus onone side or the other and I
(10:20):
think it's easier to focus onmaybe the negative component of
it.
So you know you talked aboutresilience and I know, you know
I'm kind of skipping a littlebit with you here, ali, I know
I'll edit that out.
But you know you talked aboutthere being some factors related
to resilience, so I would loveto hear more about some of those
things that you know from theresearch that we can do to be
(10:41):
more resilient as it relates toour subjective experience of
aging.
Speaker 2 (10:45):
Yeah, yeah.
So I think one of the things isjust kind of understanding
midlife as its own period oflife that's full of kind of.
These go back and forth betweenstability and transition.
Stability, transitionthroughout midlife right,
there's the the career or thefamily, or the partnerships, or
(11:07):
the loss of partnerships, andthe stability decline, right.
Or you know transition.
And so just acknowledging thattransitions are hard for you
know from my two year oldstruggles with transitions and
all the way up to transitioninginto a long term care facility
throughout our lives like atransition puberty, menopause,
like transitions are never easy,and so I think, giving
(11:27):
ourselves a little bit of gracewhen we're in those times and
then also thinking about thisperiod of development that a lot
of people never really thoughtabout before was kind of like,
yeah, you develop until you're18, you're an adult, and then
you get old and you die, right,and so I think we really can
take back this period of ourlives.
I'm almost 42, you know I'mright here with your
(11:47):
listenership and I think we cantake back this period of our
lives and kind of try torecreate what it is and find it
as a time of opportunity andgrowth and you know kind of what
I was saying earlier.
When we're able to do that,that can act as a pretty strong
protective factor.
But yeah, coping, coping skillsactually tend to get better as
(12:07):
we get older anyway.
So that's one thing that we canpractice and try and find
better ways of doing it rightDitching the alcohol, coping and
finding the problem based andthe social support and the
emotional support and thefinding of those things that
work we can get.
the more practice we have, thebetter we can get at them, if we
allow ourselves to them.
Speaker 1 (12:27):
Hmm, I think it's so interesting your
conceptualization of domains,because I'm guessing it's likely
that people have some variancewithin those.
You know, like some might bereally a strength, some might
really be a difficulty.
You know, and I don't knowwhere I'm going with this.
(12:47):
I think I would imagine there'ssome wisdom in, if you have a
strength, really building on itand capitalizing it, because it
probably kind of balances outsome of those negative areas or
helps you strengthen thosenarrative areas.
Do you see that at all?
Speaker 2 (13:04):
I think so I think that's really important and I
think, as we get to kind of justdevelopmentally, as we get to
midlife, one of the things thatpeople say from that, we did all
the focus groups and interviewsand diary studies when we were
creating this awareness of agerelated change scale, to say
what are these items that reallyresonate with people?
But people report feeling morethemselves, so they know
themselves better, they feellike they have permission to be
(13:27):
themselves more and I thinkthat's really important and can
help Right.
So it kind of this realizationthat I'm at a certain age I can
just be who I am now and I don'tknow why I couldn't before but
now I can and it's kind of anice shift.
Speaker 1 (13:43):
Yeah.
Yeah, that really resonateswith me and some of my
discussions.
It's kind of going from like asocially constructed person like
you kind of have taken in theworld, but now in midlife you
kind of have that chance todetermine your kind of internal
compass in terms of what do Ibelieve in, what do I value, how
(14:05):
do I want to do things, notnecessarily how do I think
somebody else wants me to livemy life, and so that's really, I
think, could be really valuablein this in terms of like just
that aging experience, like hey,it's okay, I'm not as worried
about what society says or whatother people are being.
I have my own internal compassabout the life I'm living.
Speaker 2 (14:24):
I think you're spot on and I think that's one of
those things.
So if you would ask somebodyoff the street of what they
think about aging, they're goingto start with all the you know,
the frailty and the declinesand thinking a lot more in the
physical realm.
But I think if we can getpeople to really realize that
there are people do report a lotof benefits to aging and if we
can start to conceptualize them,that's where the subjective
(14:45):
experiences of gains really comein, and the more we notice
those, the more protective theyseem to be.
So that's one people also tendto report and we find from the
research that emotionalwell-being tends to get better,
even in the face of reallysevere losses the loss of a
lifetime spouse, the loss ofsome major physical functioning.
(15:07):
People report being happier andthat is an ongoing finding in
the research that this field isgrappling with and coming to
find out that it's real, it'snot just kind of this strange
finding, but it keeps beingreplicated and of course there's
individual difference,individual variability across
(15:27):
everything.
That's what makes us humans.
But in general, there's a lotof benefits that people are
reporting and the funny thingabout studying aging is you
haven't been there yet, right?
It takes a lot of talking topeople and listening and
understanding many, manydifferent types of experiences.
Speaker 1 (15:45):
I love hearing that because I really do think that's
not the narrative.
The narrative is oh, it'sdecline.
You're getting grazed, you havethis midlife crisis, but it's
not that it does not have to bethat.
Like you said, midlife ischallenging and there are lots
of different individualexperiences, but we've grown an
experience.
We've grown in Skills, we'vegrown in our emotional
(16:07):
well-being, hopefully, and wecan be more intentional about
what we know brings us joy andin meaning.
So I just really love hearingthat.
So could you tell us a littlebit more?
If you haven't?
I know you've given ussomething, but are there more
practical steps that you couldtell us about how to cultivate a
positive, subjective agingexperience?
Speaker 2 (16:27):
Yeah, yeah, absolutely.
I think one of the mostimportant things is checking our
biases.
So you know, a lot of these areimplicit and we don't even
notice.
I love, I love.
I'm still uncovering kind ofmessages about older people that
I haven't thought of yet, andso you know some just little
things right, like, like youknow, older people are supposed
(16:48):
to be less physically active.
There's the recliner chair, therocking chair or Not.
You're supposed to be settingyour ways, or you're supposed to
not want to try new foods, oryeah you know, supposed to be
resistant and certainly again,that individual variability
thing.
but I think if you can checkthat assumption and say, well,
maybe some older people are thatway, that are people that I
knew, but maybe I don't want tobe that way, I hope I'm still
(17:09):
trying new foods and Listening,giving new music a chance and
not writing it off when I'm like92, you know.
I hope that I can keep thismessage of openness as I
navigate my life and and checkthose biases and not let them
determine who I'm going to be.
Speaker 1 (17:25):
so I think that's.
Speaker 2 (17:27):
One thing and and you know those the birthday cards
and the even.
I mean, I think one of the mostimportant things you can do If
you're out there and you'veheard somebody recently talk
about a senior moment likesquash, that let's get rid of
this.
Speaker 1 (17:41):
Hmm.
Speaker 2 (17:42):
I think he's since I was like 18, I don't know.
It wasn't due to age then it'sprobably not now.
Speaker 1 (17:49):
That's right.
That's right.
I heard somebody else say youknow like we have, you know,
kind of difficult times acrossour lifespan, but when it's a
midlife, we almost aresocialized like, oh, it's a
midlife crisis.
You know like these thingshappen across and to give us
great ourselves grace and Ithink that's a big part of what
I'm learning from this podcastis to really question the things
that I'm hearing about myselfand my generation and and you
(18:12):
know, and decide what for myself, what I want to be, how I want
this to be, and not accept likethat's how it has to be, even
though I haven't been there.
Well, I get a forge, my ownpath, right.
Speaker 2 (18:22):
I think so and I think it's worth questioning and
maybe maybe there's somethingthat happened that it is due to
age.
But I think a lot of times isnot going to be and there is
good research that show.
That show is that it's kind ofan age attribution bias happens.
You know, you could be like ohwell, I, you know, went for my
hike and my my right knee isjust an excruciating pain.
It's just because I'm gettingold.
(18:43):
Well, your left knee is thesame age.
It's not.
Maybe not because of age.
There's maybe something wrongand having making these age
attributions can actually getpeople to delay treatment or
skip it all together and then itcan get worse.
Speaker 1 (18:57):
Yeah, yeah, exactly One thing I wanted to give you
the chance to talk about arekind of the societal
implications of subjective aging.
You've mentioned some of that,but do you have more that you
want to say about?
About that?
Speaker 2 (19:08):
I mean, I think, health on a pretty wide range.
So we can't have thisconversation and not talk about
Becca Levy, who's a one of theleading researchers in this
field, who has shown so manyOutcomes linked to negative
attitudes towards aging andnegative beliefs, but one of the
most cited ones that she foundand reported was seven and a
half year longevity difference,so people who report more
(19:31):
positive use of aging may liveseven and a half years longer.
On that, and that is a prettysignificant chunk of time.
So I mean, of course we want tomake sure we have those years,
as it's healthy, but that's apretty, pretty long chunk of
time.
But so I think, societally, thereduction of negative age
stereotypes and negative focuson experiences of personal aging
(19:54):
I mean the research has tied tohealth, is a lot of this name
of you right.
So cardiac event,hospitalization, depressive
symptoms, cognitive decline,even neural neuropathology
associated with Alzheimer'sdisease and this one's
interesting linked to healthbehaviors.
So people who have morepositive views on aging engage
(20:15):
in more positive healthbehaviors, right, they go to the
doctor, they wear theirseatbelts, they may quit smoking
, that kind of a thing.
So so it's kind of like takingan active part in feeling like
you have some control over theaging process.
So I think if we can kind ofship this on a societal level, I
think maybe we can see betterhealth across the board, which
would be pretty huge.
Speaker 1 (20:34):
Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 2 (20:35):
Yeah exactly.
Speaker 1 (20:37):
I mean, we can do it I joke about this, I say it too
often.
My fault on this podcast is Ikind of get overly optimistic,
but I want to do it, we can tochange that narrative.
You are speaking from a sciencebased perspective that you know
.
Subjective aging makes adifference, both at a societal
level and an individual level,and we don't need to accept
(20:59):
those stereotypes anddifficulties that we've had in
the past.
You know, I heard you say someof the the negative associations
, and earlier you mentioned thatthere are a lot of positive
things to aging to.
Would you just, off the top ofyour head, name some of those,
just to kind of balance it out,because I think those would be
kind of the types of things tohave in our minds and in our
conversations about.
(21:19):
Yeah, aging can be difficult,all ages of life are difficult,
but here are some of thepositive things about this as
well.
What would you say about that?
Speaker 2 (21:28):
yes, the positive changes that come with aging
that we know people report, yeah.
So I think the improvement inrelationship quality, social
relationships kind of get bettersocial skills as we have more
practice, a sense of knowingourselves better and maybe being
able to be a bit more true toourselves than when we were
(21:50):
younger.
Speaker 1 (21:51):
For sure.
Speaker 2 (21:52):
Better emotional regulation, better coping skills
, more engagement in healthbehaviors.
In general, people do tend totake better care of themselves
as they get older.
Speaker 1 (22:04):
That's right.
That's right, that's right.
And we are kind of thatsandwich generation, you know.
So sometimes we're taking morecaregivers for our parents and
or caregivers for our children.
But our children are becomingmore independent too.
So I think sometimes we mighthave more independence at this
age as well for those developingthe kind of those resilience
behaviors and putting those inour routine.
Speaker 2 (22:25):
Yes, right.
So what you mentioned isdefinitely one of the known
stressors of midlife is justthat the competing roles and
responsibilities, that there'smore people need you than ever
before.
You may be at the peak ofmanaging things at work and home
and family and young ones andolder family members, and
neighborhoods and councils andboards and all of it.
(22:46):
You know there's, there's andthat can be, that can be a
stressor.
Speaker 1 (22:51):
There's so much great knowledge about this topic from
you, ali.
I know it's an emerging areaand you've been writing about
this a lot, but you know howwould you advise us to use this
knowledge to live healthier,more fulfilling lives?
Speaker 2 (23:05):
Yeah, thanks for asking.
I mean, I think one of thethings that we can do is find
and be mentors with people ofall ages.
So I've heard the advice onetime that you should have people
, friends like actual friends,who are older than you and
younger than you, right, so thatyou can always be learning from
(23:25):
somebody and always be teachingsomebody what you've learned,
right.
Speaker 1 (23:27):
Oh, I love that.
Speaker 2 (23:28):
In our society we kind of tend to be age
segregated 55 plus communities.
Maybe it's age segregated bychoice, right, but I'm all a fan
of more integrated agecommunities.
So, you can learn from eachother, rely on each other, teach
each other what we know, sharestrengths and you know, watch my
kid for an hour.
I can grab your groceries whileI'm at the store.
(23:50):
You know those kinds ofintertwined neighborhoods and
communities that I think we'vemoved away from.
Speaker 1 (23:56):
I love that You're so right.
It seems that's the type ofadvice that, like once you hear
it, you're like, yeah, thatmakes so much sense?
Speaker 2 (24:04):
Yeah, I don't do it.
Speaker 1 (24:06):
You know that's such a great recipe because we can
learn from those who have beenahead of us that we may maybe
doing the things that we'regoing to be encountering.
And yet it is a reallysatisfying time in midlife to be
mentoring people because wehave been through some things
and it helps us realize I knowfor me it helps me realize that
I have learned a few tricks thatI have some skills to share,
(24:27):
you know, and it's just really afulfilling thing.
Yeah, I love that.
Speaker 2 (24:31):
I think it's important to be present and
visible in those roles too thatyou know our older neighbors
should be mentoring us and weshould have.
You know there's a lot it's.
Social media is hard.
It can go either way, right,there can be.
There's some tendency to focuson the super-agers and the
bodybuilders and the you knowpeople who probably the general
(24:53):
public is not going to thatlevel of functioning.
But I think we need morerealistic examples and mentors
of what it looks like to growold in a way that I don't know.
It's just well and taking careof each other and taking care of
ourselves and not limiting whatwe're doing based on what we
expect aging to be Allie.
Speaker 1 (25:15):
I'm just doing a quick cut to just say well, this
is amazing stuff, I think, forme on our outline, I'm getting
to the conclusion.
Speaker 2 (25:24):
Is that?
Speaker 1 (25:24):
kind of what have you been through some of the stuff
on your 1-3-3 so far?
Yeah, I think.
Speaker 2 (25:27):
I got through everything I wanted to.
Speaker 1 (25:29):
Okay, I wanted to, just can I?
I want to just ask if for a fewminutes I just want to ask you
like kind of my ownclarifications, perhaps you know
, and it may be something thatwe don't keep or anything like
that, and then go into thoseconclusion questions.
So this is kind of me justbeing curious, and so I'm
(25:50):
curious as I kind ofconceptualize this about those
domains cognitive, what werethey?
Speaker 2 (25:58):
again, cognitive Physical functioning and health,
cognitive, interpersonal,social cognitive and social
emotional, so kind of how werelate socially and emotionally
with others.
And then leisure and lifestyle.
Speaker 1 (26:15):
Okay, so those are the main domains that you've
been measuring as far as itrelates to aging and life
satisfaction.
Is that accurate?
Speaker 2 (26:23):
Yes.
Okay so yeah, so we didn't havea on our measure, we didn't
have a workplace, one, ah, asfar as I know, there's a
stereotype measure thatcolleagues in Germany created
does.
Speaker 1 (26:36):
Yeah, so why?
I kind of ask that is, I'minterested in you know how
that's useful or how that getsselected?
Because as I'm hearing thoseand thinking about those, those
seem to be like if we were goingto try to be clear about what's
important in lives andwell-being, like those would be
five domains to focus on,developing and be aware of those
(27:02):
.
Like I think it's one thing tosay I'm going to be happy and
helpful and whatever today, butreally what's important to me,
what's important for mylong-term well-being, Does those
domains relate to that?
Speaker 2 (27:13):
So somewhat, they sure do.
There's probably a more helpfulscale of what you're what you
might be looking for.
Dr Carol Riff had created thepsychological well-being scales
SPWE scales for psychologicalwell-being, and there's six
facets to that and they are moreon the.
(27:34):
So if there's not a physicalone, they're more kind of
individual personality orpsychological characteristics.
So, purpose growth.
Speaker 1 (27:48):
Yeah, yeah, that makes sense.
So this is really just kind offor me.
How did you select those, youknow?
How did you select the five?
Speaker 2 (27:55):
that you got.
How did?
Speaker 1 (27:55):
those make the list, or what stands out about those?
Speaker 2 (27:57):
Where do these come from?
Yeah, so, dr Riff, it's kind oflike her whole career of
research that these, so you knowkind ofa combination of
qualitative and quantitativework of you know, looking at
what the interviews and thetranscripts say and then doing
some data analyses as well andsome factor analysis to
(28:19):
establish the six distinctscales from one.
Speaker 1 (28:22):
Okay, so, yeah, she okay Cool.
So she took all that data anddetermined that those are the
five primary domains to measureand there's a.
Speaker 2 (28:32):
I don't know if it's in the public domain or not.
You'd be able to find it as anacademic for sure.
But yeah you can take it andsee how you can kind of see your
profile and how you were on thedifferent scales and so the
idea there, and we use hermeasure as an outcome in a lot
of our research where we'repredicting predicting well-being
based- on perceptions of agingand we make a distinction.
(28:54):
You know her scales focus a lotmore on eudaimonic well-being
versus hedonistic right.
So, it's not the like you know,bubble bath, chocolate, great
glass of wine, kind of feelinggood stuff, happiness maybe but
it's more like deep sadness.
You might not be smiling allthe time, you might not feel
happy, but you feel fulfilledand satisfied.
Speaker 1 (29:14):
Yes, very cool.
All right, that satisfies mycuriosity.
Personally, that's part of thebenefits of this job.
Speaker 2 (29:19):
I need your time wisely, but very cool.
Speaker 1 (29:25):
All right, so we'll move to the last section here.
Oh, this is such great, greatinformation, allie.
This is a fascinating topic anda useful practical one as well
too.
So I'm curious to somebodywho's really studied this, you
know, what are some of yourfinal thoughts you'd like to
leave our listeners with aboutsubjective aging and midlife.
Speaker 2 (29:45):
Yeah, I think there's a lot.
I mean, one of the cool thingsabout attitudes is that they're
under our control, they're freeto change right, we don't have
to pay any money, and just takesa little effort.
And I think starting to checkour biases and expectations of
aging earlier on, like, I think,in midlife, we're doing
ourselves a real favor toprevent those extra decades from
(30:09):
just having internalizedstereotypes over time that
really get under our skin andreally have a stronger effect.
So I think that checking ourbiases and really just kind of
thinking about is this aging,this is how I want aging to be,
and realizing that there's lotsof different possibilities there
is important.
I think that you know I've beentalking about positive views on
(30:30):
aging and I always like toclarify here I'm not saying that
aging is easy and perfect andhappy all the time.
There are some seriouschallenges, real, real difficult
aspects, and for some peoplemore than others, but I don't
think it's ever easy, and so Ithink what I'm advocating here,
for which I really want to makeclear, is that even people who
(30:52):
have been are devastating thingsare able to also find positive
aspects of their life andpositive aspects of growing
older and new opportunities andand it can maybe help offset
some of the negative, but it'snot.
Instead, it's not denying, it'snot replacing.
Speaker 1 (31:11):
Right, that makes total sense.
Yeah, yeah, I know I could goon and on here.
I'm sure you could.
You know kind of along thatvein.
You know, like what are someresources?
If people are wanting to findout more, what would you
recommend if people want to kindof go more in depth on this?
Speaker 2 (31:30):
Yeah, I've been laughing because you have been
using this phrase changing thenarrative.
And that's actually anorganization out of Denver, an
hour down the road from me, andtheir entire purpose is to
eradicate ageism.
So, changing the narrative,you're already there, you
shouldn't, oh awesome, checkthem out.
They have a fantastic websitewith lots of great newsletter,
(31:51):
lots of great resources andevents that are remote.
You can tune into from anywhere, and they've had they've done
some really creative things,like they've had a birthday card
competition where local artistscan submit positive, aging
message birthday cards and, youknow, actually win a cash award
and then they sell them andeverything.
Speaker 1 (32:11):
So that is so cool.
Yeah, that sounds like theperfect answer as you might
guess I would say, after sayingthat over and over here I will
definitely check that out.
I might have to get a poster inmy room or something.
Oh, very cool.
Speaker 2 (32:28):
That's a good resources there.
I'll just put in a plug for ourCenter for Healthy Aging here
at Colorado State University.
There's some really greatresources and tons of good
research talks and things.
If you want to just find outmore about aging in general not
necessarily attitudes towardsaging, but like information and
the science there's so much goodresearch going on in lots of
(32:48):
different fields Biomedical,actually veterinary.
There's comparative medicinetype stuff, psychology,
sociology, design all kinds offields can come to aging
business, all kinds of things.
So some really neat talks there.
Bec Alevi I mentioned as aresearcher who's published all
(33:08):
of this great academic work, butshe just came out with a book
last year called Breaking theAge Code, where she's talking
about this exact topic and hassome nice strategies in there
and some neat stories throughouther career.
Yeah, and then there's there.
I mean, there's a lot ofacademic work too.
So if you're interested insearching for things in
(33:31):
development, developmentalscience, human development
psychology we have a new metaanalysis coming out, or that
just came out this year,updating so I think it was
talking earlier on about howthis field is growing so fast.
We did a meta analysis in 2014and there were gosh less than 20
studies that we were able toinclude, and now there's over
(33:53):
100 in this update oh my gosh 10years later.
Speaker 1 (33:55):
So we're not really wow, really add it must.
That really adds to the what weknow about it, the
effectiveness, the confidence wecan have in this kind of
construct, and wow, that'sincredible.
I'll make sure to get the somelinks from you too after this
show and put them in thedescription so listeners can
find those even easier.
So so, yeah, allie, this is areally important topic to our
(34:17):
listeners and to society ingeneral, and so, again, I just
want to say thank you for allthat you've done on this, to
being and to being too, and forbeing willing to come on this
kind of you know out therepodcast on midlifers.
It's just really reallyappreciated and I think it's
going to help a lot of people.
So thank you so much for whatyou're doing and thank you for
(34:38):
joining us today.
Speaker 2 (34:39):
Thanks for giving it some space.
I love talking about it and I'mglad you find it as interesting
as I do.
Speaker 1 (34:44):
So Cool, I'll stop there and just say awesome,
allie, thank you, and justmaking sure, yeah, you got you.
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