Middle Adulthood
Social & Personality Development

Prepared by Ethel Cantu

Based on Development Across the Lifespan, 2nd Ed

by Robert Feldman, Prentice-Hall

Psychosocial Development in Middle Adulthood

• Personality at midlife

– Normative-crisis models

– Nonnormative models

• Marriage and divorce

• Relationships with adult children

• Relationships with aging parents

Personality
Normative-Crisis Models

• Midlife crisis: stressful period triggered by review and reevaluation of one’s life brought on by awareness of mortality

• Existence of universal, psychologically necessary midlife crisis is in doubt

– Strong evidence for stability of personality

– Personality influenced more by time when important events occur than by age

Normative-Crisis Models

• Erikson: generativity vs stagnation

– Establish and guide the next generation

– Positive outcome is care for others; Pass on ideas and values

– Negative outcome is self-indulgent, stagnant

Normative-Crisis Models

• Levinson: changing life structures

– Inevitable, overt midlife crisis, usually between 40-45

– Come to terms with dreams, construct more realistic self-image, substitute more attainable goals

– Carve out new life structures between 45-50

– Research based on small sample of men, not followed into late adulthood

Women’s Development

• Generativity varies according to role

– High-status career: work productivity, mentor

– Traditional female occupations: parenting

• Midlife crisis for both homemakers and career women

– Independence and assertiveness led to problems at home and work prompting reevaluation

– Overload

Women’s Development

• Helson: The Mills Studies

– Healthy adjustment comes from sense of mastery over life and pleasure from living

– Paid work best predictor of mastery

– Good marriage (including sex) and family best predictor of pleasure

– Highest were employed married women with children

– Lowest were unemployed, childless, married

Evaluating Normative-Crisis

• People in these studies not representative

– Mostly white, educated, middle/upper class men

– Cohort of depression and WWII

• Crisis may be due to cohort effects

• Male model may not be healthy

– Masculine tendency toward agency (self) and feminine toward communion (others) may be unhealthy in extremes

• Midlife is another transition, not crisis

Nonnormative Models

• Trait research: stability or change

– The big five (neuroticism, extraversion, openness, conscientiousness, agreeableness) change little after 30 (Costa & McCrae, 1994)

– Other research shows change, but period of least change is 40-50 (Jones & Meredith, 1996)

– Findings reflect differences in research design

– Confounding variables include changing roles

• Reversal of roles after child-raising

• Changing expectations for women and men

Timing of Events
The Social Clock

• Personality hinges on important life events

• Lifestyles are more diverse

– Off-time conditions still considered atypical

– Stronger, more negative reactions when personal assessment was “that event is late”

• Burden of support is changing

– From 1960s to 1990s more teenagers than older parents were supported by middle-aged parents

– By 2010 will reverse

Relationships

• Marriage and Divorce

• Adult Children

• Aging Parents

• Grandparenting

Marriage

• Marital satisfaction follows a U shape

– Declines during child-raising years

– Rises from middle to late adulthood

• Decline in satisfaction attributed to stresses of parenting

– Financial resources and number of children

– Division of home responsibilities

• Marital satisfaction increases when grown children depart if marriage is good

Divorce

• Divorce rate highest in early adulthood, but midlife divorce now more common

• Longstanding marriages less likely to break

– Build up marital capital: financial and emotional benefits

• Divorce in midlife can be traumatic

– More trouble adjusting, less hope for future

– Women affected more than men

• Less well off economically

• Fewer available partners for remarriage

Adult Children

• Important task for parents is to accept their adult children as they are, not as hoped to be

• Empty nest: when the last child leaves home

– Relief from “chronic emergency of parenthood”

– Hard on mothers who had not prepared for it with other roles

– Hard on fathers who regret not spending more time with their children

Adult Children

• Revolving door syndrome: boomerang children

– Return to their parents’ home after completing education, or in times of difficulty: financial, marital…

– Can lead to tension and serious conflicts

• esp if child is unemployed and financially dependent

• esp if divorced or separated child brings own children

– Can be satisfying if roles and responsibilities are negotiated

• Acknowledge child as adult; Respect privacy of each

Aging Parents

• Ties to parents grow stronger during midlife

• More objective look at parents

– Neither idealizes nor blames them for mistakes

• Realization that s/he is now the pillar of strength, not the parents

• Financial assistance, emotional support is mutual

• Get along best while parents are healthy

Aging Parents

• Caregiver for aging parents becoming more common role

– Longer life = more risk of chronic conditions

– Primary role usually falls to daughter, more difficult if she is working

• Caring for infirm, disabled, mentally deteri-orated strains relationship

Sandwich Generation

• Caught between competing needs of children and parents with limited time, energy and resources

– Conflicts with personal life

– Rewards and stresses

• Care for parents seen as nonnormative

– Do not expect to care for parents; Unprepared

– Torn between love and resentment

Grandparenting

• Most new grandparents are 45-50, in prime of life and still working

• Grandparenting styles

– Companionate: enjoy frequent, casual relationship

– Remote: see grandchildren infrequently, more symbolic relationship

– Involved: discipline and correct grandchildren, involved in decision-making with parents

Grandparenting

• Impact of divorce and remarriage

– Grandparents have rights to visitation

– Grandparents may have step grandchildren

• Raising grandchildren

– Parents by default: death, addiction, underage…

– Strains because of reduced energy and stamina, financial burdens, feel cheated out of traditional roles, feel out of touch, guilt and anger toward adult child, lack of respite care

Grandparenting

• Rewards include love, sense of purpose in life

• Obstacles

– Some discrimination against grandparent caregivers in AFDC payments

– No legal status if they don’t have custody

– Grandchildren not eligible for health insurance under grandparents’ policy

– Gaining custody is difficult, risky, expensive