Session 8B: Ageing and Adaptation

1st Global Conference

Friday 3rd July – Saturday 5th July 2009
Mansfield College, Oxford

Literature on life long learning is predominantly concerned with the utility of learning in relation to work and training. This narrow conceptualisation of lifelong learning-work nexus marginalizes and almost invalidates the idea that learning can be done for pleasure or sapiential reasons. When focussing on lifelong learners other than those involved for some vocational/meritorcatic intent, the dominant approach is concerned with learning for remediation of some kind of deficit or for assisting with social skills that help in the adaptation to changing life and health circumstances. This situation raises the question; what about older people who are relatively ‘healthy, wealthy, and wise’ who engage in learning for pleasure or for non utilitarian aims?

This trend may be revelatory of the shift in “social facts” about human ageing that may now be understood less as chronologically and milestone driven, and be more a reflection of comprehending the human lifespan in terms of a quality of life paradigm. Undertaking education for its own sake by older adults reflects research about the need for “self-actualisation” in later life and the concomitant desire for intergenerational interaction and transfer of knowledge and experience.  This paper discusses and analyses the issues surrounding the changing nature and meaning of later life learning with a focus on Higher Education.

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A monolithic notion of a leisure-filled life as a retirement ideal is giving way to more diversified options. This paper discusses major factors which are considered to generate diversity in positive life models pursued after normative retirement age, and attempts to construct a typology of core models. Based on some key theories, including ones on productive aging, third age, and de-institutionalization of the life course, along with analysis of empirical evidence from various sources, including market surveys and research studies, two crucial factors for diversity were identified: “work orientation” and “perception of the life stage.” Combinations of the two factors yielded a typology with five distinct positive life models: Second Career, Neo-Golden Years, Extension of Midlife Career, Traditional Golden Years, and Portfolio Life. While the validity of the typology has yet to be tested, it is expected to serve as a useful tool for wide-range of future research concerning this life stage.

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Storied Lives: An Exploration of Life Course Narrative Identities and the Factors Linked to Happiness in Later Life
Deirdre O’Donnell
Gender Equality Research Unit (CGWS), School of Histories and Humanities, Trinity College Dublin, Dublin Ireland

This paper will present ongoing doctoral research which is critically examining biographical and life course narratives as the medium through which situated people reveal multiple contingent identities. These identities are shaped by life-course experiences of gender and social class. Biographical interviews with men and women aged over seventy and living within a socially disadvantaged community in Dublin, Ireland will be undertaken using NVivo analytical software. Analysis of the storied lives of these older people will provide insight into factors which are linked to happiness in later life. The focus of this doctoral research is to understand how happiness is defined and constructed by those reflecting on the situated experiences of a long life.

Informed by symbolic interactionist theory and grounded in an understanding of the ‘self as social’, this research employs a hermeneutic approach to the study of storied lives. It is a unique study in Ireland as it aims to interpret the human experience of ageing and self construction in the context of enormous social, economic and cultural change.

This paper will present the findings from the pilot phase of the study. Analysis of ten life course interviews with five participants (two men and three women) aged over seventy will be presented. The interviews will be interpreted within the context of the growing body of literature pertaining to positive psychological well-being and happiness. This research seeks to understand how individuals can construct their happiness, with varying degrees of success, within physical, historical, social, cultural and economic constraints.

This paper will provide key insights into the subjective experience of ageing in Ireland as it interacts with gender and social class. This will have implications for the understanding of ageing and happiness within the intersections of society, culture and individual psychology.

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