Beliefs about aging affect our health: A lecture add-on
This is the second in a series of posts based on Becca Levy’s book Breaking the age code: How your beliefs about aging determine how long & well you live.
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Psychological scientist Becca Levy’s stereotype embodiment theory “proposes that negative age beliefs bring about detrimental health effects that are often, and misleadingly, characterized as the inevitable consequences of aging. At the same time, positive age beliefs do the exact opposite; they benefit our health” (Levy, 2022, p. 15).
Reread the above paragraph. The societal messages that tell us about the horrors of aging are slowly killing us.
You’ll be unsurprised to hear that we begin to internalize these messages in childhood, an internalization that continues through adolescence and adulthood. This internalized stereotype operates below our conscious awareness. As we perceive the stereotype to be more relevant to us, it affects us even more. Lastly, and most importantly for the purposes of this blog post, stereotypes about aging “impact our health through psychological, biological, and behavioral pathways” (Levy, 2022, p. 15).
The American Psychological Association has identified seven integrative themes (APA, 2022), a structure that is very helpful for thinking about how and what we teach in Intro Psych. Of particular relevance to this post is theme #3: “Psychological, biological, social, and cultural factors influence behavior and mental processes.”
After discussing the reality of aging in the lifespan chapter of your Intro Psych course or as an example of theme #3 early in your course, introduce students to Levy’s stereotype embodiment theory. Next, share with students some of the cultural, social, psychological, and biological factors that contribute to it:
Cultural factors: Many of us live in a culture where ageism is a socially acceptable prejudice (Weir, 2023). The message is clear: Being old is bad.
Social factors: When our friends, family, and acquaintances make dismissive “OK, Boomer” comments, older people feel less valued. In fact, that seems to be the goal of the person saying “OK, Boomer” (Frey & Bisconti, 2023).
Psychological factors: Once we internalize the cultural message that being old is bad, it is hard to feel good about oneself.
Biological factors: Levy and her colleagues have “found that negative age beliefs can increase biological markers of stress…Over time, more frequent and higher spikes in stress biomarkers can lead to earlier death” (Levy, 2022, pp. 18–19).
Talking about stereotype embodiment theory not only gets us to think about how our attitudes about aging affect our own life trajectory and outcomes, but also how our attitudes may affect others, including those we love dearly.
References
APA. (2022). Psychology’s Integrative Themes. American Psychological Association. https://www.apa.org/ed/precollege/undergrad/introductory-psychology-initiative/student-learning-outcomes-poster.pdf
Frey, K. T., & Bisconti, T. L. (2023). “Older, entitled, and extremely out-of-touch”: Does “OK, boomer” signify the emergence of a new older adult stereotype? Journal of Applied Gerontology, 42(6), 1200–1211. https://doi.org/10.1177/07334648231154044
Levy, B. (2022). Breaking the age code: How your beliefs about aging determine how long & well you live (First edition). William Morrow, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers.
Weir, K. (2023, March 1). Ageism is one of the last socially acceptable prejudices. Psychologists are working to change that. Monitor on Psychology. https://www.apa.org/monitor/2023/03/cover-new-concept-of-aging