The effect of mortality salience on status consumption among elderly individuals: the moderating role of chronological age and subjective age

PurposeOver the past two decades, a large body of research has examined the effect of the awareness of the inevitability of death on consumption behaviours. However, the literature has shed little light on the effect of mortality salience (MS) on elderly individuals. The present research specifically aims to challenge the effect of MS on status consumption among elderly individuals.Design/methodology/approachTwo experiments were conducted among individuals over 50. The experiments manipulated MS to test its effect on status consumption.FindingsThe results demonstrate that MS positively influences the preference for status products among elderly individuals (experiment 1) and that this effect is less pronounced as elderly individuals age (experiment 2). Subjective age bias, defined as the potential gap between chronological age and subjective age, negatively moderates this effect (experiment 2).Practical implicationsLuxury marketers need to pay attention to generational cohorts rather than other demographic variables in the segmentation of their market. Moreover, subjective age may be a better segmentation variable for marketers than objective variables such as chronological age.Originality/valueThis research provides insights that support a better understanding of status consumption among elderly individuals and the role of subjective ageing in this process.

ADHD overdiagnosis and the role of patient gender among Iranian psychiatrists

Background Regarding the controversy about the overdiagnosis of Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) in children and adolescents there are two main directions addressed as issue of age bias and issue of gender bias. In this relation, replication of findings demonstrating significant overdiagnosis is of importance which make the systematic evaluation of such occurrence necessary. Objective The seminal study by Bruchmüller, Margraf & Schneider, 2012 is replicated here, although in a different cultural context, in this case Iran, as ADHS might be perceived differently there. We assessed both gender bias and the impact of potential overdiagnosis on treatment recommendations. Methods A total of 344 licensed Iranian psychiatrists (mean age = 45.17, SD = 9.50) participated in this study. Each psychiatrist received a cover letter that introduced the study as well as a case vignette. Overall, there are eight different cases, one child with ADHD and three non-ADHD children, for both a boy (Ali) and a girl (Sara). Participants also received a questionnaire requesting their particular diagnosis, treatment recommendation and the therapist’s sociodemographic information. Chi square tests and multiple logistic regression were applied for data analyses. Results Overdiagnosis occurred in both girl and boy children, although overdiagnosis was 2.45 more likely in boys than in girls (p < 0.01). With respect to the psychiatrist’s gender, we detected no difference between males or females, as both overdiagnosed ADHD in boys (pfemale < 0.01 and pmale < 0.01). Furthermore, ADHD overdiagnosis had a direct impact on medication prescription (p < 0.01). Conclusion This study suggests that diagnosticians should strictly adhere to diagnostic criteria to minimize diagnostic error.

No evidence of spatial representation of age, but “own-age bias” like face processing found in chimpanzees

Previous studies have revealed that non-human primates can differentiate the age category of faces. However, the knowledge about age recognition in non-human primates is very limited and whether non-human primates can process facial age information in a similar way to humans is unknown. As humans have an association between time and space (e.g., a person in an earlier life stage to the left and a person in a later life stage to the right), we investigated whether chimpanzees spatially represent conspecifics’ adult and infant faces. Chimpanzees were tested using an identical matching-to-sample task with conspecific adult and infant face stimuli. Two comparison images were presented vertically (Experiment 1) or horizontally (Experiment 2). We analyzed whether the response time was influenced by the position and age category of the target stimuli, but there was no evidence of correspondence between space and adult/infant faces. Thus, evidence of the spatial representation of the age category was not found. However, we did find that the response time was consistently faster when they discriminated between adult faces than when they discriminated between infant faces in both experiments. This result is in line with a series of human face studies that suggest the existence of an “own-age bias.” As far as we know, this is the first report of asymmetric face processing efficiency between infant and adult faces in non-human primates.

Contextual effects in age perception and the own-age bias

Our judgement of certain facial characteristics such as emotion, attractiveness or age, is affected by context. Faces that are flanked by younger faces, for example, are perceived as being younger, whereas faces flanked by older faces are perceived as being older. Here, we investigated whether contextual effects in age perception are mediated by an own age bias. On each trial, a target face was presented on the screen, which was flanked by two faces. Flanker faces were either identical to the target face, were 10 years younger or 10 years older than the target face. We asked forty older (64-69 years) and forty-three younger adults (24-29) to estimate the age of the target face.Our results replicate previous studies and showed that context affects age estimation of faces flanked by target faces of different ages. These context effects were more pronounced for younger compared to older flankers but present across both tested age groups. An own-age bias was observed for unflanked faces such that older adults had larger estimation errors for younger faces compared to older faces and younger adults. Flanker effects, however, were not mediated by an own-age bias. It is likely that the increased effect of younger flankers is due to mechanisms related to perceptual averaging.

Challenges in the PREHOSPITAL emergency management of geriatric trauma patients – a scoping review

Background Despite a widely acknowledged increase in older people presenting with traumatic injury in western populations there remains a lack of research into the optimal prehospital management of this vulnerable patient group. Research into this cohort faces many uniqu1e challenges, such as inconsistent definitions, variable physiology, non-linear presentation and multi-morbidity. This scoping review sought to summarise the main challenges in providing prehospital care to older trauma patients to improve the care for this vulnerable group. Methods and findings A scoping review was performed searching Google Scholar, PubMed and Medline from 2000 until 2020 for literature in English addressing the management of older trauma patients in both the prehospital arena and Emergency Department. A thematic analysis and narrative synthesis was conducted on the included 131 studies. Age-threshold was confirmed by a descriptive analysis from all included studies. The majority of the studies assessed triage and found that recognition and undertriage presented a significant challenge, with adverse effects on mortality. We identified six key challenges in the prehospital field that were summarised in this review. Conclusions Trauma in older people is common and challenges prehospital care providers in numerous ways that are difficult to address. Undertriage and the potential for age bias remain prevalent. In this Scoping Review, we identified and discussed six major challenges that are unique to the prehospital environment. More high-quality evidence is needed to investigate this issue further.

Sex and age bias viral burden and interferon responses during SARS-CoV-2 infection in ferrets

SARS-CoV-2 (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2) hospitalizations and deaths disportionally affect males and older ages. Here we investigated the impact of male sex and age comparing sex-matched or age-matched ferrets infected with SARS-CoV-2. Differences in temperature regulation was identified for male ferrets which was accompanied by prolonged viral replication in the upper respiratory tract after infection. Gene expression analysis of the nasal turbinates indicated that 1-year-old female ferrets had significant increases in interferon response genes post infection which were delayed in males. These results provide insight into COVID-19 and suggests that older males may play a role in viral transmission due to decreased antiviral responses.