Age Norms and the Spirit of Capitalism

Adulthood is often associated with hard work, in contrast to childhood and later life, which are associated with play, education, and leisure. Yet the work-fixated sense of adulthood is about more than just age norms. Like any such ethos, it is situated in socioeconomic history. Workers are forced to work hard, the work ethic framing their exploitation within an aura of moral righteousness. According to Weber the normative weight commonly associated with ‘hard work’ derives from the advent of Protestantism in the late middle ages. Weber says that this new worldview birthed the ‘spirit of capitalism,’ and set the stage for the modern world to take shape. In the seventeenth century—hence roughly coinciding with mercantilism and the Reformation—was the invention of the modern concept of childhood, i.e. the radical division of childhood from adulthood. This period also inaugurated the European Enlightenment, where reason was elevated as a supremely honorable aspect of humanity, in many ways as a new source of this-worldly pseudo-salvation. ‘Adulthood’ was infused with these values—the ideal [male] adult is rational, responsible, hard-working, self-sufficient, and financially secure. It was adulthood, more than and in contrast to other times of life (e.g., childhood and later life), that absorbed and normalized the new economic and cultural trends. The moral elevation of hard work, combined with the greater demarcation of adulthood in contrast to childhood and later life, set up children and older adults to take on a status of moral inferiority due to their exclusion from the working world.

Constructing Age for Young Readers

Children's literature studies has been relatively slow in adopting techniques from digital humanities. This article explains a method for digitising, annotating, and analysing texts in xml to investigate the implicit age norms that children's books convey. The case studies are seventeen books by Bart Moeyaert and La Belle Sauvage by Philip Pullman. The analysis of speech distribution, topic modelling, syntactic parsing, and lexical analysis with digital tools adds information about implicit age norms that can support and inspire narrative analyses with close reading.

CHARACTERIZATION OF THE IMMUNE STATUS OF YOUNG HOCKEY PLAYERS PUBERTY

Relevance. In modern publications, sufficient attention is paid to the study of the cellular composition of peripheral blood and the immune status of athletes. These studies are carried out at various stages of the training process in order to establish a connection between the registered changes and the nature and severity of muscle loads. The available literature data mainly relate to the indicators of the immunity of adult athletes involved in various sports, recorded at various stages of training and characterizing the adaptation to muscular load. The state of the immune system largely determines the success of a sports career in modern sports. Aim of the study: to assess the immune profile (cellular and humoral link) of pubertal hockey players at the beginning of the preparatory stage of the training period. Materials and methods. To assess the immune profile (cellular and humoral link) of pubertal hockey players at the beginning of the preparatory stage of the training period, the relative and absolute content of lymphocytes was studied by the method of immunophenotyping with the determination of their subpopulation composition (CD3 +, CD3 + CD4 +, CD3 + CD8 +; CD3- CD16 + CD56 +, CD19 +, CD4 + / CD8 +), and by turbidimetry - specific proteins (immunoglobulins A, G, M). Results. The obtained values of the studied indicators did not differ from those of adolescents who do not go in for sports, and generally fit into the age norms. Isolated cases of deviations are associated with the characteristics of the morbidity of the examined adolescents. The recorded immune profile of athletes will be used as reference values during the continuation of the study (at the end of the pre-competition and post-competition periods), the purpose of which is to monitor the impact of the training process on the immunity of athletes of puberty. The obtained values of the studied indicators do not differ from those in the control and, fit into the age norms. In conclusion, the authors come to the conclusion that it is possible to use the recorded immune profile of athletes as reference values during the continuation of the study (at the end of the preparatory stage and at the end of the competitive period), the purpose of which will be to assess the impact of the training process on the immunity of athletes of puberty.

The Impact of Age Stereotypes and Age Norms on Employees’ Retirement Choices: A Neglected Aspect of Research on Extended Working Lives

This article examines how older workers employ internalized age norms and perceptions when thinking about extending their working lives or retirement timing. It draws on semi-structured interviews with employees (n = 104) and line managers, human resource managers and occupational health specialists (n = 52) from four organisations in the United Kingdom. Previous research has demonstrated discrimination against older workers but this is a limiting view of the impact that ageism may have in the work setting. Individuals are likely to internalize age norms as older people have lived in social contexts in which negative images of what it means to be “old” are prevalent. These age perceptions are frequently normalized (taken for granted) in organisations and condition how people are managed and crucially how they manage themselves. How older workers and managers think and talk about age is another dynamic feature of decision making about retirement with implications for extending working lives. Amongst our respondents it was widely assumed that older age would come with worse health—what is more generally called the decline narrative - which served both as a motivation for individuals to leave employment to maximize enjoyment of their remaining years in good health as well as a motivation for some other individuals to stay employed in order to prevent health problems that might occur from an inactive retirement. Age norms also told some employees they were now “too old” for their job, to change job, for training and/or promotion and that they should leave that “to the younger ones”—what we call a sense of intergenerational disentitlement. The implications of these processes for the extending working lives agenda are discussed.

Gender differences in perception of the appropriate maturity age for men and women: Age norms of reproduction-related life events between the social context and evolutionary foundations

The paper explores gender differences in the perception of appropriate age for reproduction-related life events. Evolutionary theory suggests that age norms are shaped by gender-specific evolutionary challenges. We tested two hypotheses based on the evolutionary rationale. Hypothesis 1 suggests that both men and women believe that women should reach maturity and experience reproduction-related life events earlier than men. Hypothesis 2 claims that men and women demonstrate this tendency asymmetrically. When women estimate the appropriate/ideal age for men, they suggest a higher appropriate age for men than men themselves. When men estimate the appropriate/ideal age for women, they suggest a younger age for women compared to women themselves. In the second part of the paper, we explored the background of these claims by testing the alternative explanations based on ‘social forces’ (culture, socio-economic status, education, age, values). The hypotheses were tested using the 9th wave of the ESS data, totaling around 47 thousand respondents and the sample of Balkan countries was analyzed in more detail. The appropriate age was measured using ‘ideal age’ as the concept which reflects the optimal timing expectations for reproduction-related events: living with a partner, marriage, and parenthood. Respondents were also asked to make judgments about the appropriate age of becoming an adult for men and women. The overall results supported the outlined expectations based on the evolutionary approach. The results did not provide convincing evidence for the alternative, non-evolutionary interpretation of the identified patterns.

Gender differences in perception of the appropriate maturity age for men and women: Age norms of reproduction-related life events between the social context and evolutionary foundations

The paper explores gender differences in the perception of appropriate age for reproduction-related life events. Evolutionary theory suggests that age norms are shaped by gender-specific evolutionary challenges. We tested two hypotheses based on the evolutionary rationale. Hypothesis 1 suggests that both men and women believe that women should reach maturity and experience reproduction-related life events earlier than men. Hypothesis 2 claims that men and women demonstrate this tendency asymmetrically. When women estimate the appropriate/ideal age for men, they suggest a higher appropriate age for men than men themselves. When men estimate the appropriate/ideal age for women, they suggest a younger age for women compared to women themselves. In the second part of the paper, we explored the background of these claims by testing the alternative explanations based on ‘social forces’ (culture, socio-economic status, education, age, values). The hypotheses were tested using the 9th wave of the ESS data, totaling around 47 thousand respondents and the sample of Balkan countries was analyzed in more detail. The appropriate age was measured using ‘ideal age’ as the concept which reflects the optimal timing expectations for reproduction-related events: living with a partner, marriage, and parenthood. Respondents were also asked to make judgments about the appropriate age of becoming an adult for men and women. The overall results supported the outlined expectations based on the evolutionary approach. The results did not provide convincing evidence for the alternative, non-evolutionary interpretation of the identified patterns.

VERBAL ABILITIES OF PSYCHOLOGY STUDENTS AT DIFFERENT STAGES OF TRAINING

Purpose: to study the level of verbal intelligence and verbal creativity of students studying in the direction of training "Psychology" of the first, second and fourth years. Methods: psychodiagnostic techniques: 1)WAIS subtest "Awareness" (D. Wexler); 2) WAIS subtest "Similarity" (D. Wexler); 3) WAIS subtest "Intelligibility" (D. Wexler); 4) WAIS subtest "Vocabulary" (D. Wexler); 5) Method of "verbal creativity" S. Mednik, adapted by A. N. Voronin; 6) Method "Assessment of productivity of verbal memory (opvp) (five-minute)" O. F. Potemkina, E. S. Romanova. To confirm the significance of differences between groups of students of different courses, the student and Mann - Whitney criteria were used. Results: As a result of the psychodiagnostic study, data were obtained indicating that: the majority of respondents have a low volume of verbal memory; the level of verbal intelligence of the majority of psychology students in this study is average. This development of verbal abilities allows you to successfully master the training program, but creates the possibility for doubts about the future professional competence of psychologists in this stream. The level of development of verbal abilities of psychology students in different courses does not significantly differ. The verbal intelligence of students does not correspond to the age norms of the 80-90 years of the twentieth century, the majority of respondents have an IQ level lower than the values of 1981 and 2001. Practical significance: the main provisions and conclusions of the article can be used in scientific and pedagogical activities when working with students of the appropriate profile.