From Cicero to Cohen: Developmental Theories of Aging
From Cicero to Cohen: Developmental Theories of Aging
Several other developmental theorists have built upon Erikson's writings about the life cycle in adulthood. In his seminal work The Seasons of a Man's Life, Yale psychologist Daniel Levinson detailed early and middle adult tasks and transitions based upon longitudinal interviews with 40 individual men (Levinson et al., 1978). Interviews with women were published posthumously in The Seasons of a Woman's Life (Levinson & Levinson, 1996). Levinson's work differed from Erikson in several respects. First, Levinson did not anchor his theory in psychodynamic theory or in the central role of tensions or conflicts that emerge during successive stages. He postulated instead that major life transitions were influenced by evolving physiological, psychological, and role-oriented life changes. For example, the passage into middle adulthood occurred when "instinctual energies … pass their maximal level and are somewhat reduced … A man is by no means lacking in the youthful drives—in lustful passions, in the capacity for anger and moral indignation, in self-assertiveness and ambition, in the wish to be cared for and supported. But he suffers less from the tyranny of these drives" (Levinson et al., 1978, p. 25). Levinson echoes Cicero here, who also believed that an attenuation of instinctual drives would liberate more mature pursuits, because "Nothing for which you do not yearn troubles you" (Cicero, 44 BC/1951, p. 144). As Levinson described, "the modest decline in the elemental drives may, with mid-life development, enable a man to enrich his life. He can be more free from the petty vanities, animosities, envies and moralisms of early adulthood … He can become a more caring son to his aging parents … and a more compassionate authority and teacher to young adults" (Levinson et al., 1978, p. 25). A list of Levinson's developmental periods can be found in Figure 2.
(Enlarge Image)
Figure 2.
Levinson's developmental periods (Levinson et al., 1978).
Another key difference is that Levinson's developmental periods were based upon empirical research with adults, whereas Erikson's stages were based on clinical work—mostly with younger individuals. As a result, Levinson's stages and transitions hinged mostly on events within their chronological limits, whereas Erikson's stages integrated potential and extant strengths and weaknesses from across the lifecycle. For example, whereas Erikson might describe a life event within the bonds of ego-syntonic and ego-dystonic forces, Levinson lets it stand-alone "as a marker indicating where he now stands and how far he can go. This culminating event represents some form of success or failure, of movement forward or backward on the life path" (Levinson et al., 1978, p. 31).
Like Erikson, Levinson's focus was primarily on young and middle adulthood, and the concept of old age was poorly developed and stereotyped. For example, he posits late adulthood as a time when "a man can no longer occupy the center stage of his world … a man receives less recognition and has less authority and power. His generation is no longer the dominant one" (Levinson et al., 1978, p. 35). This waning of power and influence may be accompanied by the fear "that the youth within him is dying and that only the old man—an empty, dry structure devoid of energy, interests or inner resources—will survive for a brief and foolish old age. His task is to sustain his youthfulness in a new form appropriate to late adulthood. He must terminate and modify the earlier life structure" (Levinson et al., 1978, p. 35).
Like Levinson, Harvard psychiatrist George Vaillant based his stage theory both on Erikson's work and on the longitudinal study of aging adults though his extensive empirical research as director of the Study on Adult Development at Harvard (Vaillant, 2002, 2012). "Like Erikson," he wrote, "I have concluded that one way to conceptualize the sequential nature of adult social development may lie in appreciating that it reflects each adult's widening radius over time. Imagine a stone dropped into a pond; it produces ever-expanding ripples, each older one encompassing, but not obliterating, the circle emanating from the next ripple. Adult development is rather like that" (Vaillant, 2002, p. 44).
In contrast to Erikson, Vaillant's own perspective moves away from emphasizing "stages" and instead focuses on the "developmental tasks" of life that are typically but not always sequential (Vaillant, 2002). Vaillant outlines how an adolescent's main task is to establish an identity separate from his or her parents. Young adulthood brings the task of learning to sustain a mutual, committed relationship. In both young and middle adulthood, Vaillant stresses the role of career consolidation in which the individual is able to work at life's chosen vocational tasks with appropriate sociability and a sense of satisfaction. Generativity grows out of one's career and represents an expansion of purpose to be a leader for the next generation. Vaillant found in his longitudinal studies that successful generativity tripled the chances that an individual would experience more joy than despair in their 70s (Agronin, 2010; Vaillant, 2002). Vaillant's scheme is illustrated in Figure 3.
(Enlarge Image)
Figure 3.
Vaillant's developmental tasks. Based on Vaillant (2002). Reprinted from Agronin (2010), with permission.
Old age is best represented by Vaillant's fifth and sixth development tasks labeled "Keeper of the Meaning" and "Integrity," respectively. These concepts bridge many of the tasks, which Erikson assigned to both generativity and integrity and involve a focus "on conservation and preservation of the collective products of mankind – the culture in which one lives and its institutions – rather than on just the development of its children" (Vaillant, 2002, p. 48). An older individual serving as the Keeper of the Meaning is generally less ideological because there is a widening and less selective circle of concern. His or her efforts and energies often allow for more meaningful intergenerational relationships because they tap into the enduring foundations of culture and history (Agronin, 2010). The last developmental stage of integrity echoes that of Erikson, indicating the necessary task of accepting and finding some meaning and ownership over what has come before in life, without succumbing to despair over the narrowing possibilities of age (Agronin, 2010).
Psychologist Carol Gilligan has critiqued Erikson, Levinson, and Vaillant for proposing theories based primarily on male development, where separation, individuation, and achievement are consequentially seen as the ideal endpoints (Gilligan, 1982). As she wrote in her seminal work In A Different Voice, "thus there seems to be a line of development missing from current depictions of adult development, a failure to describe the progression of relationships toward a maturity of interdependence" (Gilligan, 1982, p. 155). She further states that none of the case studies provided by any of the aforementioned theorists adequately supported the notion that separation or individuation led to or enhanced attachment and mutuality. Thus, "the reality of continuing connection is lost or relegated to the background where the figures of women appear" (Gilligan, 1982, p. 155). The missing voice of women's development not only robs developmental theories of enormous datapoints but more fundamentally biases our thinking on the very trajectories of development.
Gilligan focuses primarily on the unique role of interpersonal connections in female development. Read from this more inclusive standpoint, Gilligan asserts that fundamental components of the life cycle such as identity must be expanded to "include the experience of interconnection" (Gilligan, 1982, p. 173). In contrast to the lives of many men, then, such a force may better lead women to develop a "maturity realized through interdependence and taking care" (Gilligan, 1982, p. 172). Although these forces were studied by Gilligan in young women (Gilligan et al., 1990), they have not been examined in the lives of aged women or men.
Post-Eriksonian Developmental Theories
Several other developmental theorists have built upon Erikson's writings about the life cycle in adulthood. In his seminal work The Seasons of a Man's Life, Yale psychologist Daniel Levinson detailed early and middle adult tasks and transitions based upon longitudinal interviews with 40 individual men (Levinson et al., 1978). Interviews with women were published posthumously in The Seasons of a Woman's Life (Levinson & Levinson, 1996). Levinson's work differed from Erikson in several respects. First, Levinson did not anchor his theory in psychodynamic theory or in the central role of tensions or conflicts that emerge during successive stages. He postulated instead that major life transitions were influenced by evolving physiological, psychological, and role-oriented life changes. For example, the passage into middle adulthood occurred when "instinctual energies … pass their maximal level and are somewhat reduced … A man is by no means lacking in the youthful drives—in lustful passions, in the capacity for anger and moral indignation, in self-assertiveness and ambition, in the wish to be cared for and supported. But he suffers less from the tyranny of these drives" (Levinson et al., 1978, p. 25). Levinson echoes Cicero here, who also believed that an attenuation of instinctual drives would liberate more mature pursuits, because "Nothing for which you do not yearn troubles you" (Cicero, 44 BC/1951, p. 144). As Levinson described, "the modest decline in the elemental drives may, with mid-life development, enable a man to enrich his life. He can be more free from the petty vanities, animosities, envies and moralisms of early adulthood … He can become a more caring son to his aging parents … and a more compassionate authority and teacher to young adults" (Levinson et al., 1978, p. 25). A list of Levinson's developmental periods can be found in Figure 2.
(Enlarge Image)
Figure 2.
Levinson's developmental periods (Levinson et al., 1978).
Another key difference is that Levinson's developmental periods were based upon empirical research with adults, whereas Erikson's stages were based on clinical work—mostly with younger individuals. As a result, Levinson's stages and transitions hinged mostly on events within their chronological limits, whereas Erikson's stages integrated potential and extant strengths and weaknesses from across the lifecycle. For example, whereas Erikson might describe a life event within the bonds of ego-syntonic and ego-dystonic forces, Levinson lets it stand-alone "as a marker indicating where he now stands and how far he can go. This culminating event represents some form of success or failure, of movement forward or backward on the life path" (Levinson et al., 1978, p. 31).
Like Erikson, Levinson's focus was primarily on young and middle adulthood, and the concept of old age was poorly developed and stereotyped. For example, he posits late adulthood as a time when "a man can no longer occupy the center stage of his world … a man receives less recognition and has less authority and power. His generation is no longer the dominant one" (Levinson et al., 1978, p. 35). This waning of power and influence may be accompanied by the fear "that the youth within him is dying and that only the old man—an empty, dry structure devoid of energy, interests or inner resources—will survive for a brief and foolish old age. His task is to sustain his youthfulness in a new form appropriate to late adulthood. He must terminate and modify the earlier life structure" (Levinson et al., 1978, p. 35).
Like Levinson, Harvard psychiatrist George Vaillant based his stage theory both on Erikson's work and on the longitudinal study of aging adults though his extensive empirical research as director of the Study on Adult Development at Harvard (Vaillant, 2002, 2012). "Like Erikson," he wrote, "I have concluded that one way to conceptualize the sequential nature of adult social development may lie in appreciating that it reflects each adult's widening radius over time. Imagine a stone dropped into a pond; it produces ever-expanding ripples, each older one encompassing, but not obliterating, the circle emanating from the next ripple. Adult development is rather like that" (Vaillant, 2002, p. 44).
In contrast to Erikson, Vaillant's own perspective moves away from emphasizing "stages" and instead focuses on the "developmental tasks" of life that are typically but not always sequential (Vaillant, 2002). Vaillant outlines how an adolescent's main task is to establish an identity separate from his or her parents. Young adulthood brings the task of learning to sustain a mutual, committed relationship. In both young and middle adulthood, Vaillant stresses the role of career consolidation in which the individual is able to work at life's chosen vocational tasks with appropriate sociability and a sense of satisfaction. Generativity grows out of one's career and represents an expansion of purpose to be a leader for the next generation. Vaillant found in his longitudinal studies that successful generativity tripled the chances that an individual would experience more joy than despair in their 70s (Agronin, 2010; Vaillant, 2002). Vaillant's scheme is illustrated in Figure 3.
(Enlarge Image)
Figure 3.
Vaillant's developmental tasks. Based on Vaillant (2002). Reprinted from Agronin (2010), with permission.
Old age is best represented by Vaillant's fifth and sixth development tasks labeled "Keeper of the Meaning" and "Integrity," respectively. These concepts bridge many of the tasks, which Erikson assigned to both generativity and integrity and involve a focus "on conservation and preservation of the collective products of mankind – the culture in which one lives and its institutions – rather than on just the development of its children" (Vaillant, 2002, p. 48). An older individual serving as the Keeper of the Meaning is generally less ideological because there is a widening and less selective circle of concern. His or her efforts and energies often allow for more meaningful intergenerational relationships because they tap into the enduring foundations of culture and history (Agronin, 2010). The last developmental stage of integrity echoes that of Erikson, indicating the necessary task of accepting and finding some meaning and ownership over what has come before in life, without succumbing to despair over the narrowing possibilities of age (Agronin, 2010).
Psychologist Carol Gilligan has critiqued Erikson, Levinson, and Vaillant for proposing theories based primarily on male development, where separation, individuation, and achievement are consequentially seen as the ideal endpoints (Gilligan, 1982). As she wrote in her seminal work In A Different Voice, "thus there seems to be a line of development missing from current depictions of adult development, a failure to describe the progression of relationships toward a maturity of interdependence" (Gilligan, 1982, p. 155). She further states that none of the case studies provided by any of the aforementioned theorists adequately supported the notion that separation or individuation led to or enhanced attachment and mutuality. Thus, "the reality of continuing connection is lost or relegated to the background where the figures of women appear" (Gilligan, 1982, p. 155). The missing voice of women's development not only robs developmental theories of enormous datapoints but more fundamentally biases our thinking on the very trajectories of development.
Gilligan focuses primarily on the unique role of interpersonal connections in female development. Read from this more inclusive standpoint, Gilligan asserts that fundamental components of the life cycle such as identity must be expanded to "include the experience of interconnection" (Gilligan, 1982, p. 173). In contrast to the lives of many men, then, such a force may better lead women to develop a "maturity realized through interdependence and taking care" (Gilligan, 1982, p. 172). Although these forces were studied by Gilligan in young women (Gilligan et al., 1990), they have not been examined in the lives of aged women or men.
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