Middle adulthood

1. Middle adulthood

2. Surprises, surmises Lawrence Minet

3. Formal operations in Adulthood About 50% of adolescents aged 16 use formal operations

4. Formal operation thinking • Doesn’t automatically occur as a maturational event, even though brain maturation may have something to do with it • Training and experiences will make a significant difference to the ability to use formal operational thinking • Complex multicultural, technological societies create a huge demand for formal operational thinking • Traditional “village” cultures had far less need to think in formal operational terms

5. A simple deduction • deductive reasoning. The use of a premise or premises to create conclusions or the use of general ideas to create specific ideas. • Premise 1: all Social Practice Students must complete all first year papers before they can go out on placement; • Premise 2: Hyacinth is out on placement. What can you deduce from this?

6. A simple deduction • Deduction: Hyacinth must have passed all first year papers.

7. A more complex deduction process • understanding of causation - how cause and effect relationships play out over time. • How to Identify and control the variables that have impact on your life, your family, your work, your culture, the economy, etc • What variables would be important to discuss when explaining the long term damage caused by substance abuse?

8. Complex causal relationships • The development of serious problems from substance abuse can take place slowly over a long period of time • variables • maintenance of general health and diet • safety precautions taken to avoid disease • amount and frequency of use of the drug • risks of imprisonment and/or social isolation • type of drug • quality of the product, etc

9. Being comfortable with false premises • Formal operational people can reason logically or analyse the structure of an argument, independent of the truth or falseness of its content. Video • What would the world be like if water was red?

10. What would the world be like if water was red? • Everything (all plants and animals) that contained water would be reddish, • There would have to be a lot more names for shades of red, • Trees and plants would look whitish because red and green light together make white, • Oxygen would run out quickly because photosynthesis wouldn’t work • The sky, reflecting the ocean, would be red • We wouldn’t notice our world had gone red

11. Proportional reasoning • Mathematical reasoning about the multiple relationships between variables - concerned with inference and prediction.

12. Proportional reasoning • Here is a picture of Mr. Tall and Mr. Short. •  Mr. Short is six paper clips in height. If he is measured in large buttons he is four large buttons in height. • Mr. Tall is similar to Mr. Short but is six large buttons in height. • Predict the height of Mr. Tall in paper clips. Explain.

13. Typical Solutions – formal operational • Multiplicative Reasoning 1: “He is nine paper clips tall. Each button is equal to one and a half paper clips. If he is six buttons tall you multiply six time one and a half to get nine paper clips.” • Multiplicative Reasoning 2: “Mr. Tall is 1 ½ times as high as Mr. Short. Since Mr. Short is 6 clips high, Mr. Tall must be 6 * 1 ½ = 9 clips high.” • Multiplicative Reasoning using addition: “For every two buttons there are three paper clips. Mr. Tall is 2 buttons taller than Mr. Short so he must be 3 paper clips taller. 6 + 3 = 9 paper clips.”

14. Typical Solutions – concrete operational • Additive Reasoning 1: “Mr. Tall is 8 paper clips high. Mr. Short is 4 large buttons high and 6 paper clips high. So the buttons are 2 less than the paper clips. Since Mr. Tall and Mr. Short are similar, and Mr. Tall is 6 buttons high, he must be 8 paper clips high.” • Additive Reasoning 2: “Mr. Tall is two more buttons taller than Mr. Short so he will also be two more paper clips taller than Mr. Short resulting in 8 paper clips.” • Estimate: “Nine, I figured he would be a bit taller.” • Haphazard: “Since Mr. Tall is 2 more buttons than Mr. Short, I took the 6 paper clips and multiplied by 2 to get 12 paper clips.”

15. Predicting the future • Probabilistic reasoning: Calculating the likelihood of occurrence of a specified event • Compared to nonsmokers, people who smoke are about 18 times more likely to develop lung cancer. Every year 8.3 /100.000 non-smokers die of lung cancer. • What’s the prediction for lung cancer for smokers? • If you were a smoker should you be worried?

16. Predicting the future • If I am a smoker my chances of dying of lung cancer next year are 18*8.3/100,000 =150/100,000 or 0.15% • If I am a 20-year old smoker, my chance of dying of lung cancer in the next 40 years if I continue to smoke are 40*150/100,000 = 6000/100,000 or 6% • 6% doesn’t sound too bad, until you add it to all the other way smokers die – the gap in life expectancy between smokers and non-smokers is 7 years.

17. inductive reasoning  • combining related observations to create generalizations, principles, models, and theories • Observation 1: Jama’s sister suddenly became seriously ill, he was given an extension for his assignment; • Observation 2: Yvgeny’s cousin suddenly became seriously ill, he wasn’t given an extension for his assignment. • What theory might we create from these observations?

18. inductive reasoning • Induction: the illness of a cousin isn’t sufficient, cause to get an extension – the disruption has to be within the nuclear family Here we are creating a theory about how extensions work. We are trying to generalise from these observations to a general premise that we can test. Here we start to engage with the complex inductive and deductive processes that underlie moral reasoning

19. Being Idealistic • We become Idealistic – we can about think about what is possible - about the ideal characteristics of ourselves, others, and the world. • What are you idealistic about? • As students become more idealistic in particular and more skilful formal operational thinkers they become more critical of the teachers, the process, the content of the BSocP

20. Moral relativismMorality is relative and different moral truths hold for different people.Ethical subjectivism -morality is relative to individual subjective analysis;

21. Moral Relativism – Foundations of Morality From Jonathan Haidt’s TED talk http://www.ted.com/talks/jonathan_haidt_on_the_moral_mind.html The five core moral values: • Harm/care • Fairness reciprocity • In group loyalty • Authority/respect • Purity/sanctity Do the Moral Foundations Questionnaire

22. Liberal and Conservative moral positionsgreen=Geoff – is he morally complex (relativistic)?

23. Cultural relativism - morality is relative to a cultural analysisCreate an argument for and against Moral Relativismread God-Man extract

24. Ageing Perceptions Questionaire

25. Timeline chronic (TCH) The extent to which awareness of one's age or aging and one’s experience of the process of aging is chronic in nature, e.g. 'I always classify myself as old'. Chronic awareness of one's own aging is related to the concept of 'age identification' and this has been associated with inactivity and poor health. Scores above 3 suggest some degree of chronic awareness of aging. Score from 2033 Irish 65 – 90 year olds (Mean=74 years) = 2.9

26. Timeline Cyclical (TCY) The extent to which awareness of one's age or aging and one’s experience of the process of aging is cyclical in nature, e.g. 'I go through phases of feeling old'. The concept of cyclicality has received little empirical attention to date. Scores above 3 suggest some degree of cyclic awareness of aging. Score from 2033 Irish 65 – 90 year olds (Mean=74 years) = 2.7

27. Consequences positive (CQP) Positive beliefs about the impact of aging on one's life across a variety of domains (e.g. 'As I get older I get wiser'). The assumption of positive aging consequences has been linked with greater creativity and greater subjective well-being. Scores above 3 suggest some degree of positive beliefs about aging. Score from 2033 Irish 65 – 90 year olds (Mean=74 years) = 3.7.

28. Consequences negative (CQN) Negative beliefs about the impact of aging on one's life across a variety of domains (e.g.'Getting older makes everything a lot harder for me'). the assumption of negative aging consequences has been linked with depression and lower subjective well-being. Scores above 3 suggest some degree of negative beliefs about aging. Score from 2033 Irish 65 – 90 year olds (Mean=74 years) = 3.4.

29. Control Positive (CNP) positive beliefs about personal ways of managing one's experience of aging – control over positive experiences (e.g. 'The quality of my social life in later years depends on me'). Having a strong sense of control over one's development can facilitate well-being throughout the life cycle. Control plays out in two ways: firstly with the efforts that people make to control their environment (work, family. leisure, health) to suit their needs, and, secondly, with the various ways in which people reinterpret themselves or their situation so as not to become overwhelmed when the environment will not yield to their influences. Scores above 3 suggest some degree of positive beliefs about aging. Score from 2033 Irish 65 – 90 year olds (Mean=74 years) = 3.8

30. Control Negative (CNN) negative beliefs about personal ways of managing one's experience of aging - control over negative experiences (e.g. 'Immobility in later life is not up to me') relating to aging. Where we have negative beliefs we think that age reduces our ability to do the things we want to do in work, family. leisure and health, or recover form the setbacks we might experience in these areas. Scores above 3 suggest some degree of negative beliefs about aging. Score from 2033 Irish 65 – 90 year olds (Mean=74 years) = 2.65

31. Emotional representations (ER): the emotional response generated by aging. It is specifically represented by negative emotions such as worry, anxiety, depression, fear, anger, and sadness (e.g., 'I get depressed when I think about getting older'). Negative emotional responses to aging have been associated with negative changes in physical and functional health and with maladaptive coping. Scores above 3 suggest some degree of negative emotional response about aging. Score from 2033 Irish 65 – 90 year olds (Mean=74 years) = 2.4

32. The identity subscale examines the experience of 17 health related changes Scores on these subscales (S1 – the experience of change, S2 - the attribution of that change to the process of aging) can range from 0–17. The percentage of health related changes attributed to aging is then tabulated as S1/S2*100. This yields an identity score. Scores for identity can range from 0 to 100. Scores above 50 suggest some possibility of over attribution of changes in health to the consequences of aging. Score from 2033 Irish 65 – 90 year olds (Mean=74 years) = 65

33. What do you imagine the last 15-40 years of your life will be like? If you have scores above 3 on Timeline Chronic, Consequences Negative, Control Negative and/or Emotional Responsiveness and below 3 on Consequences Positive and Control Positive, can think about strategies that would give you a more positive view of what life will be like as you age?

34. What do you imagine the last 15-40 years of your life will be like? • Work, retirement and income • Partner relationships and sex • Connections with family and grandchildren • Learning and creativity • Staying healthy • Going into a retirement village or rest-home • Death of your partner • Your approach to dying and euthanasia

35. Why is it important to be a formal operational thinker?

36. How (logically) to cause a Global Recession • Provide mortgages for houses that are selling at highly inflated prices • Mix these risky mortgages with good mortgages in products called derivatives • Create similar derivates with shares and bonds – mix the economically strong with the appalling risky • Create secret incentives for international credit rating agencies to give these derivatives a high credit rating and thus be able to sell them at considerable profit

37. How (logically) to cause a Global Recession • Repeat this exercise several times, mixing high priced, “high rating” derivates with shonky mortgages, shares and bonds, exceeding the value of the components by $billions • Encourage rampant consumerism as a means to continue this Ponzi scheme indefinitely • Call anyone who gets worried an “alarmist”. If you can’t work it out, how can your clients?

38. Why is it important?

39. Hypothetical Deductive Reasoning  • Deductive reasoning about abstract or hypothetical things. Do the following problems: • Chris is left of Sam and Sam is left of Ben, Where is Chris in relationship to Ben? • A is less than B; B is less than C what is A compared to C? • Given an equal arm balance constructed so that the weights can be hung at equal increments from the centre, if three weights of the same mass are placed six units from the centre, how many weights of equal mass have to be placed three units on the opposite side to balance? 

40. Hypothetical Deductive Reasoning • Chris is to the right of Ben • A is less than C • 6 3 0 3 6 • Algebraically : x*weights*3 = 3*weights*6, x=3*6/3 = 6

41. Predicting the future • Correlational reasoning: uses the relationship between two or more sets of data to predict the likelihood of other relationships • Countries with higher levels of mental illness, obesity, imprisonment, teen age pregnancies, and lower levels of literacy and life expectancy have greater income gaps between rich and poor. New Zealand is such a country. What might this tell us about how we should approach the future?

42. Predicting the Future • That rich people should earn less or pay more taxes? • The poor people should be able to earn more? • That if we do something about reducing mental illness, obesity, imprisonment, teen age pregnancies, and improving literacy and life expectancy the income gap must become smaller?

43. Metacognition – it’s what we teach • An externalising process in that it allows us to look at ourselves as if we were looking at another person. • Helps us think about what strategies we use for learning, how we manage our emotions and how others might be receiving who we are. • Meta cognition is a process of reflection which asks for any activity you do, what’s happening to you, what’s that about, why am I thinking/feeling that, what’s working and what’s not, how could I change things? • Metacognition requires the development of those parts of the brain involved with executive functioning - evaluation, planning, and emotional regulation – primarily the prefrontal cortex