The End of Retirement as We Know It?

" Successful aging " is one of gerontology's most successful ideas. Applied as a model, a concept, an approach, an experience, and an outcome, it has inspired researchers to create affiliated terms such as " healthy, " " positive, " " active, " " productive, " and " effective " aging. Although embraced as an optimistic approach to measuring life satisfaction and as a challenge to ageist traditions based on decline, successful aging as defined by John Rowe and Robert Kahn has also invited considerable critical responses. This article takes a critical gerontological perspective to explore such responses to the Rowe–Kahn successful aging paradigm by summarizing its empirical and methodological limitations, theoretical assumptions around ideas of individual choice and lifestyle, and inattention to intersecting issues of social inequality, health disparities, and age relations. The latter point is elaborated with an examination of income, gender, racial, ethnic, and age differences in the United States. Conclusions raise questions of social exclusion and the future of successful aging research.

BETWEEN SUCCESSFUL AND UNSUCCESSFUL AGEING: SELECTED ASPECTS AND CONTEXTS, 2019

Journal of Applied Gerontology, 2009

Many scholars now critique successful aging terminology. Nonetheless, there is incomplete analysis of the political motivations behind the development of and/or effects of widespread use of these terms. This article suggests that analysis of the people who developed the terms and the settings within which they work parallels an analysis of the terms themselves and illustrates the continuing negative perception of aging. This study fleshes out a more thorough critique of the sociopolitical contexts surrounding the successful aging paradigm so that it can help renew and expand existing critiques. The authors conclude that researchers need to be wary of adopting successful aging terminology without considering and expanding their understanding of the political motivations and results that accompanies it. New, expanded conceptualizations of successful aging are needed so that socially minded researchers and practitioners of gerontology do not contribute to ageism and discrimination against older adults.

Health and Wellbeing in Late Life, 2019

The term "successful ageing" has gained much popularity among scientists, researchers, politicians and geriatricians (such as myself) when referring to the older adults in the last three decades [1]. However, when I enquired about what "successful ageing" meant to an octogenarian or a nonagenarian, there was hardly any awareness about this term among them. Although most people would like to be physically, psychologically and financially independent, feel satisfied with their life and die in a dignified way, to most octogenarian "life is a path that they have almost travelled, an experience that they have already experienced". For many people, life is just a component in the cycle of birth and death. When I simplified the questions and asked about their life satisfaction, quality of life and late-life participation as per their ability, in the context of social and family, the respondents were mostly clueless. Prevalent notions such as "ageing successfully is a destiny, which cannot be modified" or "ageing means disability and dependence, with an uncertain future about dignity and autonomy" influence the attitude towards the sunset years. So, what about the preparation for successful ageing from middle life or late adulthood (60-75 years)? What about increasing physical and cognitive reserve, thereby building a high intrinsic capacity? There was a paradigm shift, particularly in societies such as Japan, Sweden, the USA, the UK and a few European countries-which have been preparing for active ageing for the last couple of decades-towards disrupting ageing through optimization of mental and physical involvement and minimizing functional loss. Thus, understanding about successful ageing from an individual's perspective within the local sociocultural milieu is important.

2006

The Gerontologist, 2014

Purpose of the Study: Everyone wants to age successfully; however, the definition and criteria of successful aging remain vague for laypersons, researchers, and policymakers in spite of decades of research on the topic. This paper highlights work of scholars who made significant theoretical contributions to the topic. Design and Methods: A thorough review and evaluation of the literature on successful aging was undertaken. Results: Our review includes early gerontological definitions of successful aging and related concepts. Historical perspectives reach back to philosophical and religious texts, and more recent approaches have focused on both process-and outcomeoriented models of successful aging. We elaborate on Baltes and Baltes' theory of selective optimization with compensation [Baltes, P. B., & Baltes, M. M. (1990a). Psychological perspectives on successful aging: The model of selective optimization with compensation. In P. B. Baltes & M. M. Baltes (Eds.), Successful aging: Perspectives from the behavioral sciences (pp. 1-34). United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press], Kahana and Kahana's preventive and corrective proactivity model [Kahana, E., & Kahana, B. (1996). Conceptual and empirical advances in understanding aging well through proactive adaptation. In V. Bengtson (Ed.), Adulthood and aging: Research on continuities and discontinuities (pp. 18-40). New York: Springer], and Rowe and Kahn's model of successful aging [Rowe, J. W., & Kahn, R. L. (1998). Successful aging. New York: Pantheon Books], outlining their commonalities and differences. Additional views on successful aging emphasize subjective versus objective perceptions of successful aging and relate successful aging to studies on healthy and exceptional longevity.

Advances in social work, 2021

Successful aging is a prominent framework within gerontology, yet an understanding of how aging adults define "successful aging" is often missing in the social work discourse around what it means to age well. This cross-sectional, exploratory study used an online survey to explore community-dwelling adults' (aged 55+; n=471) definition of successful aging, the underlying components across all definitions, and any differences in components based on whether or not the adults identified as aging successfully. Summative content analysis yielded five main themes and 13 sub-themes for those who identified as aging successfully and five main themes and 11-sub-themes for those who identified as not aging successfully with elements of health constituting the largest percentage of responses across both groups. Bivariate analyses found participants in the "not aging successfully" group mentioned elements of Being Healthy and Financial Security more than those in the aging successfully group, and elements of Sustain Participation, Curiosity, and Learning less than those in the "aging successfully" group. The findings illustrate the extent to which aging adults view successful aging as the presence of health and ability. Social workers should be mindful to the ways in which adults view successful aging and the elements they believe to contribute to successful aging in order to provide and tailor programs, services, and resources that are supportive of aging adults' needs and wishes.

Nature, 2004

T homas More's Utopia, published in 1516, describes an egalitarian paradise free from the poverty and wanton greed of contemporary sixteenth-century European society. But its fictional citizens are still haunted by old age -"which as it carries many diseases along with it, so it is a disease of itself". Given the gross inequalities of the day, More's idealized society required a formidable leap of the imagination. Now a small group of scientists from the unfashionable field of gerontology is urging us to consider a similarly radical leap.Today's utopian vision, they say, should be a society in which the elderly remain fit and healthy. "People tend to associate old age with decrepitude and senility," says Rudi Westendorp, an expert on healthy ageing at Leiden University in the Netherlands. "But we have no reason to assume that weakness is inevitable in the old." This message is a timely one, given the steadily ageing demographic in most industrialized nations. Advances in medicine have reduced the terrible toll of infant mortality caused by infectious disease, and more news feature 116