Adult Development and Aging

Adult Development and AgingI deals with all of adulthood, giving equal coverage to issues facing young, middle-aged, and older persons in our society. The text examines the development of adults of all ages from a topical rather than a chronological perspective. Special consideration is given to issues regarding personality and psychopathology, clinical interventions, cognitive processes such as learning, memory, and intelligence, social roles in adulthood, physical changes with age, and death and dying. Emphases are placed on the relationships of a variety of domains of functioning to one another, on the understanding of adults within the context of the entire life span, and on the relativistic nature of adulthood. Implications for the everyday functioning of adults are stressed as is the scientific basis for our knowledge of adults of all ages. The text has a glossary, and each chapter includes a list of key terms and review questions. There are opportunities for students to evaluate the quality of their learning, as well as brief interviews with adults on a variety of topics relevant to their everyday lives such as marriage, parenting, grandparenting, hospice care, adult education and learning, and mental health.