Younger and Older Adult Interview

Young Adult Interview

After we interviewed our chosen individuals, we got together with classmates during class to do some larger qualitative analysis on our interviews and try to find some themes among our research. Here is our findings...

Perceptions of Adulthood

Key themes we found were that responsibility, independence/more access to new experiences, coming of age maturity wise, and completing societally-constructed markers of adulthood all reflect the collected information on what we found to be the start of when someone becomes an adult. 

• While many people did not mark a specific age, the age range for when these things typically happen were from 18 to 25 years old. 

• This small age range can be reflective of the institutionalization of the life course; even if adulthood is mainly defined by the experiences that get us there, it is still expected that these things happen at a specific time. 

Personally, my interviewee expressed not having met the expectations of adulthood, but still defined adulthood in that way; age roles are important, and if people do not meet what is expected, there is typically some bit of guilt or shame around it. 

Perceptions of Aging

Here, we found that people generally associated aging with declines in health and not being able to do the things they usually do, limitations in abilities. A lot of people expressed fear around aging, but there were some individuals that highlighted the privilege that it is to age. 

• Our class also found that people defined successful aging as being able to achieve life goals, have financial stability, and maintaining the health they had while they were younger. 

• Ideal age that interviewees said they would prefer to be forever were anywhere from 18 to 36 years, mainly being under the age of 30.

Historical Events and Future of Society

• Historical Events: COVID-19, 2008 Housing Crash, 9/11, technology growth, January 6th Insurrection, and Black Lives Matter protest

• Feelings about the future: Generally very negative, expressing anxiety. Some people had some hopefulness for their own personal future, but with a broader scope, not so much. 

Older Adult Interview

Like the young adult interview, after interviewing our older adult we got together with classmates during class to do some larger qualitative analysis on our interviews and try to find some themes among our research. Here is our findings...

Perceptions of Aging

These were much more mixed, some positive and negative, but mostly content with where they were in life. 

• If our interviewees indicated a negative aging experience or perception, it typically came from personal experiences

•  These personal experiences were things such as health challenges, impairment, or loss

Interviewees with not too caught up in the concept of being old, but just the things that came along with it. 

Personally meaningful events were mainly social for from social ties, such as marriage, birth of children and grandchildren.

Historical Events

The historical events that our interviewees highlighted as being personally significant were things that typically happened in their young adult life, and then listed more recent ones.

• These were things such as wars, assassinations, elections, or rights movements

• People typically find things that happened when they were younger and more engaged with politics as most impactful, and then our findings from recent events show recency bias.

Our key themes and interviews show little support for Disengagement Theory, and most interviewees talked about how important it is to stay active and engaged in the things you value and like to do!