Successful Aging

Successful aging is defined as biological, psychological, and social functioning without major diseases. Successful aging is described as evading ailment and disability, having a high cognitive, psychological, and physical function, active engagements in life, and adapting well mentally in later life. According to Urtamo, Jyväkorpi & Strandberg (2019), in psychological functioning, you know you have aged successfully when you do not have a disability or a disease and have lived a long and healthy life. However, even people with diseases can have successful aging. For cognitive functioning, aging successfully includes maintaining cognitive capabilities and preventing memory disorders. This should be a central component of successful aging and comprises insight, attention, memory, and higher functions. Maintaining physical function is a very significant component of successful aging. You know you are aging successfully when you engage in regular physical activities because it maintains your health and reduces the chances of some diseases. Having an active social life is an important aspect of aging successfully. It reduces loneliness, offers emotional and instrumental support to you and other people.

The goals of cognitive functioning and maintaining physical function are important and connect to integrity vs. despair’s Erikson’s life stage. This is because in this stage, individuals view life differently and if they did not maintain a healthy life or maintained their cognitive abilities, they feel like they would have lived differently and felt like failures. People who maintain cognitive and physical functions are satisfied with how they lived. An active social life is also an important goal and connects to generativity vs. stagnation (Martin et al. 2014). This is because generativity involves successful mastering of one’s work, and contributing to the development of other people. It also includes engaging in productive work which contributes positively to society. The people who fail to master this task may experience stagnation and may have no connection to other people in society.

References

Martin, P., Kelly, N., Kahana, B., Kahana, E., Willcox, B. J., Willcox, D. C., & Poon, L. W.

(2015). Defining successful aging: a tangible or elusive concept?. The Gerontologist, 55(1), 14–25. https://doi.org/10.1093/geront/gnu044

Urtamo, A., Jyväkorpi, S. K., & Strandberg, T. E. (2019). Definitions of successful ageing: a

brief review of a multidimensional concept. Acta bio-medica: Atenei Parmensis, 90(2), 359–363. https://doi.org/10.23750/abm.v90i2.83768