Systematic Stereotypes Of The Elderly

Our society has become filled with different stereotypes that influence our thoughts and behaviours towards different groups within society. One aspect in which we make judgment involves age. Society has different expectations of people in specific age cohorts (McMullin, 2010). Since most of our population is becoming older, because of the baby boom, ageism revolves around the elderly since the stereotypes of the elderly include them not being active members of society. Ageism can be defined as “A process of systematic stereotyping of and discrimination against people because they are old, just as racism and sexism accomplish this with skin color and gender.” (Weiss, 2012). As a majority of our population ages, ageism becomes a growing problem

One of which would be raising awareness for the consequences of mistreating the elderly. If the public knew information such as how the if the elderly feel like a burden to their families it can make them feel depressed, then maybe people will start to go out of their way to not let the elderly in their family feel that way (Bai, Lai, & Guo, 2016). Another thing that might help the elderly is by raising awareness of elder abuse, and providing elders with more support if they are being abused. Also, caretakers of the elderly need to be trained more to recognize elder abuse, and to be able to tell if their coworkers are abusing an elder at their work. Families should also be given resources to tell if the elders in their family are being abused if they are in a nursing home, that way if there is a problem with the nursing home staff, they can be educated on what they should do. In order to help with elder abuse from family taking care of them, families should be provided with more at-home care for their seniors to help relieve stress from the family who is caring for them. Society needs to be more aware of how mistreated our elders are, especially with the baby boomers becoming older and increasing the elderly population. Lastly, the regulations involving abuse need to be adjusted to help the elderly. Since the regulations involving abuse aren’t as fine tuned as they should

Since in the future the elderly will take up a large portion of the population, regulations need to be changed in order to prevent elder abuse in every aspect. Also, since negative stereotypes can decrease life expectancy, society needs to change their views towards the elderly to help promote longevity (Weiss, 2012). Sexism and ageism can go hand in hand, and create more stereotypes towards the