Title: Activation of Aging Stereotypes in Younger and Older Adults | The Journals of Gerontology: Series B | Oxford Academic
Headings: The Activation of Aging Stereotypes in Younger and Older Adults
The Activation of Aging Stereotypes in Younger and Older Adults
Published:
Abstract
Issue Section:
Methods
Overview
Participants and Design
Stimuli
Procedure
Results
Explicit Aging Attitude Measure
Implicit Measure
Age-Based Stereotyping
Age-Based Prejudice
Discussion
Automatic Stereotyping
Automatic Prejudice
Appendix
Notes
References

Content: Hummert et al., 1995) contended that this inconsistency between attitudes toward elderly individuals versus older people as a group might be due to the multiple stereotypes of older adults that people hold. Compatible with this assumption, research on ambivalent stereotypes suggests that attitudes toward elderly people may be marked by both positive and negative perceptions ( Fiske, Cuddy, Glick, & Xu, 2002 ). Fiske and colleagues proposed that people's attitudes toward different groups are driven by their perceptions of a group's competence and warmth. These perceptions lead people to place most groups into one of two categories: ( a) groups they respect for their competence but dislike for their lack of warmth or (b) groups they disrespect for their incompetence but like and patronize for their warmth. It is this second category of groups under which elderly people fall. Fiske and associates found that groups that were similar in terms of perceived frailty (e.g., disabled people, elderly people) were clustered together with regard to perceived incompetence and warmth. In combination, these lines of research suggest that when people think of the concept old, positive associations might be just as likely to come to mind as negative associations. As with other domains of stereotyping (e.g., race, gender), using explicit measures of age-based attitudes and stereotyping can pose problems because participants may be unaware of their beliefs and sentiments or reluctant to reveal any negativity they might feel ( Fazio, Jackson, Dunton, & Williams, 1995;