Theories Of Aging

View the effects of aging as resulting from random assaults from both the internal and external evironment

See aging changes resulting from a complex, predetermined process.

Cellular division is threatened as a result of radiation or a chemical reaction in which a cross-linking agent attaches itself to a DNA strand and prevents normal parting of the strands during mitosis. Overtime agents accumulate and impede intracellular transport, ultimately causing the body's organs and systems to fail.

Highly unstable, reactive molecules containing an extra electrical charge that are generated from oxygen metabolism. Normal metabolism with other free radicals; oxidation of ozone, pesticides, and other pollutants. Damage proteins, enzymes, and DNA by replacing molecules with biological info with faulty molecules creating genetic disorder.

A lipoprotein by product of oxidation. As it accumulates it interferes with diffusion and transport of essential metabolites and information bearing molecules in the cells.

Compares the body to a machine that has lost it's ability to function. Attributes aging to repeated use and injury of the body over time. The body will function less efficiently with prolonged use and numerous insults (smoking, poor diet, substance abuse).

Hypothesizes that the differences in the aging process and longevity of various species occur due to interplay between the processes of mutation and natural selection.

Is an evolutionary theory. Aging occurs due to a declining force of natural selection with age. Genetic mutations that affect children will eventually be eliminated, the victim will not have lived long enough to reproduce. Mutations later in life will accumulate because older individuals they affect will have already passed the mutation to their offspring.

Evolutionary Theory. Accumulated mutant genes that have negative affects in late life may have had beneficial effects in early life.

Evolutionary Theory. Aging is related to the use of the body's energy rather than to genetics.

The study of the connection between aging and disease processes.

The process of programmed cell death that continuously occurs throughout life due to biochemical events.

Proposed that animals and humans are born with a genetic program or biological clock that predetermines the life span.

Genetic mutations are responsible for aging by causing organ declines as a result of self-perpetuating cellular mutations.

The primary organs of the immune system, the thymus and bone marrow, are believed to be affected by the aging process. Weight of thymus and its ability to produce T-cells, level of thymic hormone declines after age 30, undetectable in blood of people over 60. Bone marrow stem cells perform less efficiently.

Aging is the result of changes in the brain and endocrine glands.

Repeated exposure to ultraviolet light is known to age skin caused by the replacement of collagen by elastin, also a factor in skin cancer. Radiation may induce cellular mutations that promote aging.

Deficiencies of vitamins and other nutrients and excess of nutrients such as cholesterol may cause various disease processes.

The ingestion of mercury, lead, arsenic, radioactive isotopes, certain pesticides, and other substances can produce pathologic changes in human beings. Same with smoking and breathing tobacco smoke and other air pollutants. Crowded living conditions, high noise levels, and other factors are thought to influence how we age.

Views aging as a process in which society and the individual gradually withdraw, or disengage, from each other, to the mutual satisfaction and benefit of both.

Asserts that an older person should continue a middle-aged lifestyle, denying the existence of old age as long as possible, and that society should apply the same norms to the old age as it does to middle age and not advocate diminishing activity, interest, and involvement as its members grow old.

Relates personality and predisposition toward certain actions in old age to similar factors during other phases of the life cycle. Patterns developed over a lifetime will determine whether individuals remain engaged and active or become disengaged and inactive.

Views older adults as a group with distinct norms, beliefs, expectations, habits, and issues that separate them from the rest of society.

Society is stratified by age groups. Persons within a similar age group generally have similar experiences, beliefs, attitudes, and life transitions that offer them a unique shared history.

The challenges that must be met and adjustments that must be made in response to life experiences that are part of any adult's continued growth through the life span. Erik Erikson's stages of development

Aging entails a transition from a rational, materialistic metaperspective to a cosmic and transcendent vision. As people age they become more concerned with life and their connections with others and less concerned with materialistic things.