Ages and Changes:Master Class

Susan H. McFaddenFox Valley Memory Project

Appleton, WI (USA)

Overview of the class

• Metaphors and the ways we think about aging and the life span

• Erikson’s epigenetic theory• Implications for persons living with

dementia• Application of Baltes’s life span

developmental model to religion, spirituality, and aging (if there’s time for this…)

Sources of meaning in Western history (from Cole, 1992)

Metaphors of the life span(Cole, 1992)

CIRCLES

HILLS

SPIRALS

Christ-centered wheel of life, from a Psalter (1339) belonging to Robert de Lisle of Yorkshire. “I perceive all ages at once; I rule all with reason.”

The Seven Ages of Life and the Wheel of Fortune, an anonymous woodcut (ca. 1470).

The Ten Ages of Man, an engraving by Jorg Breu the Younger (Augsburg, 1540).

The Life and Age of Woman, a print by A. Alden (1836).“The virtuous woman is a crown to her husband.”

Life and Age of Man, Stages of Man’s Life from the Cradle to the Grave, a print by Currier and Ives (ca. 1850).

Erikson’s Epigenetic Theory

Erikson’s Epigenetic Theory

• Trust and mistrust• Autonomy and shame/doubt• Initiative and guilt• Industry and inferiority• Identity and identity confusion• Intimacy and isolation• Generativity and stagnation• Integrity and despair

Cut-away of nautilus shell (photograph by Paul Licht)

Erikson and religion: Implications for persons living with dementia

• Discovery of the numinous in the face of the mothering person: ordering the world in hope

• Ritual and love• The outcome of gaining a sense of identity:

fidelity (faith)• The hard won wisdom of old age: living with

the dynamic relationship of integrity and despair

Baltes’s (1987) life span development model applied to religion, spirituality, and aging

• Development is life-long• Multidirectionality• Development involves gains and losses• Plasticity (its range and its limits)• Historical embeddedness• Necessity of an interdisciplinary approach• Contextualism: dynamic interaction among

developmental influences– Age-graded influences– History-graded influences– Non-normative influences

Final thoughts and questions