Did You Know...?
Late Adult Development

Read each true/false statement and test your answers by placing your cursor over the question mark.

	By the year 2030, it is predicted that the proportion of those over 65 will double worldwide.
	Most of the visual and auditory losses of the aged cannot be corrected.
	Although older people are more susceptible to disease, they tend to recover faster from most illnesses.
	The most effective treatment for insomnia is pharmacological.
	The most widely held theory of aging is that we wear out our bodies just by living our lives.
	Current average life expectancy is about 28 years more than it was at the turn of the century.
	Most scientists believe that aging results from the “ticking” of a genetic clock.
	Individuals with stronger immune systems live longer than those with weaker immune systems.
	Women tend to have weaker, and less efficient, immune systems than men.
	By late adulthood, the flu can be fatal.
	As long as their vision and hearing remain unimpaired, older adults are no less efficient than younger adults at inputting information.
	Older adults are less efficient than younger adults at managing control processes.
	Older adults are often much better at explicit memory than implicit memory.
	Neuronal loss appears to be a significant factor in cognitive slowdown.
	A majority of the elderly feel frustrated and hampered by memory loss in their daily lives.
	The general symptoms associated with dementia are essentially the same regardless of what causes the disorder.
	Alzheimer’s disease is in some cases inherited.
	With pure vascular dementia, at first other neurons take over some of the work of the damaged area.
	Many older adults who are actually suffering from depression are misdiagnosed with a brain disease.
	Late adulthood is often associated with a narrowing of interests and an exclusive focus on the self.
	Developmentalists agree that in old age, the individual and society mutually withdraw from each other.
	About 40 percent of the elderly are involved in structured volunteer work; many of the rest volunteer informally.
	Religious faith increases with age.
	Nearly one in two older adults makes a long-distance move following retirement.
	Women have a harder time than men coping with the emotions of losing a spouse.
	Loneliness during late adulthood is greater for individuals who were never married than for any other group.
	Most older people suffer significantly from a lack of close friendships.
	Older people’s satisfaction with life bears relatively little relationship to the quantity or quality of their contact with the younger members of their own family.
	Very few Asians are in nursing homes.
	Most of the frail elderly are cared for by medical personnel.