Public Perceptions of Older People A literature review

Cathalifaud and colleagues (2008) examined perceptions of a sample of nearly
700 young people using a semantic differential measure and found that 68%
of participants associated older people with conservatism (77% in the case of
elderly men and 68% in the case of elderly women). Similar findings have
been observed in an Irish context. For example, the ARK Survey on attitudes
to older people reported that over half of the general public believed that
“older people are “too set in their ways and ideas” and 42% felt that older
adults are “not willing to listen to young people’s views” (O’Connor & Dowds
2005, p. 28).
Older people are often characterised as having negative personality traits,
particularly associated with elderly men. On the other hand, some traits
associated with warmth, i.e. outgoing, dependability, have been used to
describe older people, particularly older women. Conservatism has also been
associated with older people, i.e., being perceived as having fixed ideas and
not willing to listen to young people.
7.5.1.6 Lonely and isolated
Several studies have indicated that older people are viewed as both sad and
lonely (Tan et al. 2004; Sauer 2006). Researchers have used depictions of
facial expressions or emotions in student drawings to ascertain their images of
later life. Findings indicated ambiguity in students’ perceptions of the
emotional quality of later life (Barrett & Cantwell 2007; Barrett & Pai 2008).
Approximately 50%-62% of drawings of older people incorporated smiles
(Weber et al. 1996; Lichtenstein et al. 2005; Barrett & Pai 2008). This
supports Palmore’s (1999) contention that old age can be recognised as a
time of happiness, serenity and freedom from responsibilities such as work
and child rearing. However, Lichtenstein et al. (2005) found that, although
nearly half of the older people were drawn with smiles, follow-up questioning
revealed that only about a quarter of the figures were viewed by their artists
as happy suggesting that ageing is not necessarily considered a happy time in
a person’s life. This concurs with other studies that found nearly 40% of
images included sad, neutral or vague facial expressions (Valeri-Gold 1996;
Lichtenstein et al. 2005; Barrett & Cantwell 2007). Barrett and Pai (2008)
examined a similar sample of drawings of older people and participants
remarked that depictions of faces were expressionless and frowning.
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