Pervasive discrimination

Strangers are not the only ones who exhibit discriminatory attitudes and behaviours. Ageism, whether benevolent or hostile, also manifests in everyday interactions, within families, among friends and with neighbours. In extreme cases, prejudice can have serious consequences, leading individuals to denigrate, neglect and abuse their loved ones. Sometimes, for example, derogatory comments can spiral into more threatening verbal or even physical violence.

But ageism also shows up in much less blatant ways. At the root of ageism is the perception—which we ourselves may have adopted without realizing it—that people’s functioning and cognitive capacities necessarily and invariably decline over time. We come to underestimate the communication skills of older people, and this leads to a tendency to use infantilizing or condescending language with them, to speak more slowly or loudly, to interrupt or contradict them. Maternal or paternal attitudes toward older people are, unfortunately, very common. Indeed, the myth of older people “returning to childhood” is tenacious.

As many people as there are ways to respond to ageism

How do older adults, who are often regarded with a mix of admiration and pity, respond to individuals’ more or less awkward expressions of concern for them? Research shows that their perception depends, among other things, on their living environment and their state of health. For example, people who are institutionalized and have lower autonomy welcome this concern more than those who live at home. This being said, while articulate pronunciation and simple sentences can help with understanding, systematic repetition and exaggeration are detrimental: interactions with older adults don’t all fit into the same mold. There are as many ways to age as there are people, so we should not assume that all older adults are hard of hearing, struggle with understanding things, need help, or have limitations.

Being sidelined on a daily basis

Other everyday manifestations of ageism include stigmatizing people who are regarded as “too old”; this is generally expressed as indifference, coldness and avoidance. But who decides when we become “too old” to do something? It’s worth noting that we sometimes apply such statements to ourselves, which is referred to as “self-ageism.” Of course, dancing for hours on end or driving in rush hour can become more difficult as we get older. However, stereotyping certain activities as being for young people only contributes to marginalizing older adults, since deviating from the norm can lead to a sense of an inconsistent identity: “I don’t feel old, but everyone makes me feel that way.”

Social pressure and ageism in everyday life

The problem of ageism is magnified by the fact that we are inevitably confronted with opposing discourses: we should stay active, but accept our age; we should open the way for new generations, but stake our place as elders; we should accept certain limitations, but not let them be imposed on us.

The pressure to age “successfully” is one of the more subtle embodiments of ageism that people experience on a daily basis. We are expected, no matter what, to lead an active and healthy life, to devote ourselves to our loved ones, to be involved socially—in short, to constantly “reinvent” ourselves. At first glance, even if this “plan for aging well” seems positive in relation to negative representations of aging, studies show that it has perverse effects. First of all, the burden of success rests largely on our shoulders and fails to take our individual background and living conditions into account. Second, this “program” often generates an obsession with performance, and produces anxiety when we fall short of expectations.

Breaking with ageism requires that we as a society develop the reflex of asking questions to find out individuals’ actual abilities, aspirations and needs, whatever their age. Offering help is always better than imposing help!