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« Define septivalentDefine septuagesima »Go to Dictionary DefinitionGo to User ContributedDictionaryGo to Extensive DefinitionGo to Synonyms, Antonyms and RelatedWordsDictionary Definitionseptuagenarian n : someone whose age is in theseventiesUser ContributedDictionaryEnglishEtymologyseptuagenarius ("of thenumber seventy"), from septuāginta("seventy").NounseptuagenarianOne who is between the age of 70 and 79, inclusive.TranslationsFrench: septuagénaireLatin: septuagenariusAdjective#Being between the age of 70 and 79, inclusive.In one's eighth decade.Of or related to a septuagenarian.Related termsvicenariantricenarianquadragenarianquinquagenariansexagenarianoctogenariannonagenariancentenarianExtensive DefinitionAgeing or aging (American English) is theaccumulation of changes in an organism or object over time. Ageing in humans refers to amultidimensional process of physical, psychological, and socialchange. Some dimensions of ageing grow and expand over time, whileothers decline. Reaction time, for example, may slow with age,while knowledge of world events and wisdom may expand. Researchshows that even late in life potential exists for physical, mental,and social growth and development. Ageing is an important part ofall human societies reflecting the biological changes that occur,but also reflecting cultural and societal conventions. Age isusually measured in full years — and months for youngchildren. A person's birthday is often an importantevent.The term "ageing" is somewhat ambiguous.Distinctions may be made between "universal ageing" (age changesthat all people share) and "probabilistic ageing" (age changes thatmay happen to some, but not all people as they grow older, such asthe onset of TypeTwo diabetes). Chronological ageing, referring to how old aperson is, is arguably the most straightforward definition ofageing and may be distinguished from "social ageing" (society'sexpectations of how people should act as they grow older) and"biological ageing" (an organism's physical state as it ages).There is also a distinction between "proximal ageing" (age-basedeffects that come about because of factors in the recent past) and"distal ageing" (age-based differences that can be traced back to acause early in person's life, such as childhood poliomyelitis)..In humans and other animals, cellular senescence has beenattributed to the shortening of telomeres with each cell cycle;when telomeres become too short, the cells die. The length oftelomeres is therefore the "molecular clock," predicted byHayflick. Telomere length is maintained in immortal cells (e.g.germcells and keratinocyte stem cells,but not other skin celltypes) by the enzyme telomerase. In thelaboratory, mortal cell lines can be immortalized by the activationof their telomerase gene, present in all cells but active in fewcell types. Cancerous cells mustbecome immortal to multiply without limit. This important steptowards carcinogenesis implies, in 85% of cancers, the reactivationof their telomerase gene by mutation. Since this mutation is rare,the telomere "clock" can be seen as a protective mechanism againstcancer .Other genes are known to affect the agingprocess, the sirtuinfamily of genes have been shown to have a significant effect on thelifespan of yeast andnematodes.Over-expression of the RAS2 gene increases lifespan in yeastsubstantially.In addition to genetic ties to lifespan, diet hasbeen shown to substantially affect lifespan in many animals.Specifically, caloricrestriction (that is, restricting calories to 30-50% less thanan adlibitum animal would consume, while still maintaining propernutrient intake), has been shown to increase lifespan in mice up to50%. Caloric restriction works on many other species beyond mice(including species as diverse as yeast and Drosophila), and appears(though the data is not conclusive) to increase lifespan inprimates according to a study done on Rhesus monkeys at theNational Institute of Health (US). Since, at the molecular level,age is counted not as time but as the number of cell doublings,this effect of calorie reduction could be mediated by the slowingof cellular growth and, therefore, the lengthening of the timebetween cell divisions.Drug companies are currently searching for waysto mimic the lifespan-extending effects of caloric restrictionwithout having to severely reduce food consumption.Dividing the lifespanA human life is often divided intovarious ages. Historically, the lifespan of man was divided intosevenages; because biological changes are slow moving and vary fromperson to person, arbitrary dates are usually set to mark periodsof human life. In some cultures the divisions given below are quitevaried.In the USA, adulthood legally begins atthe age of eighteen or nineteen, while old age isconsidered to begin at the age of legal retirement (approximatelyPre-conception: ovum,spermatozoon,possible pre-existenceConception: fertilizationPre-birth: conception to birthInfancy:Birth to 2Childhood: 2 toAdolescence: 12to 19Early adulthood: 20 to 35Middle adulthood: 35 to 54Late adulthood: 55+DeathPost-Death: DecompositionAges can also be divided by decade:Denarian: someone between 10 and 19 years of ageVicenarian: someone between 20 and 29 years of ageTricenarian: someone between 30 and 39 years of ageQuadragenarian: someone between 40 and 49 years of ageQuinquagenarian: someone between 50 and 59 years of ageSexagenarian: someone between 60 and 69 years of ageSeptuagenarian: someone between 70 and 79 years of ageOctogenarian: someone between 80 and 89 years of ageNonagenarian: someone between 90 and 99 years of ageCentenarian:someone over 100 years of ageSupercentenarian:someone over 110 years of ageCultural variationsIn some cultures (for example Serbian and Russian) there aretwo ways to express age: by counting years with or withoutincluding current year. For example, it could be said about thesame person that he is twenty years old or that he is intwenty-first year of his life. In Russian the former expression isgenerally used, the latter one has restricted usage: it is used forage of a deceased person in obituaries and for age of a child whenit is desired to show him/her older than he/she is. (It seems thata boy in his 4th year is older than one who is 3 years old.)Considerable numbers of cultures have less of aproblem with age compared with what has been described above, andit is seen as an important status to reach stages in life, ratherthan defined numerical ages. Advanced age is given more respect andstatus.EastAsian age reckoning is different from that found in Westernculture. Traditional Chinese culture uses a different agingmethod, called Xusui (虛歲) with respect to common aging which iscalled Zhousui (周歲). In the Xusui method, people are born at age 1,not age 0.SocietyLegalThere are variations in many countries as to what agea person legally becomes an adult.Most legal systems define a specific age for whenan individual is allowed or obliged to do something. These agesinclude voting age,drinkingage, age ofconsent, age ofmajority, age of criminal responsibility, marriageableage, age where one can hold public office, and mandatoryretirement age. Admission to a movie for instance, may dependon age according to a motion picture rating system. A bus fare might be discountedfor the young or old.Similarly in many countries in jurisprudence, the defenseof infancy is a form of defenseby which a defendantargues that, at the time a law was broken, they were notliable for theiractions,and thus should not be held liable for a crime. Many courts recognize that defendantswho are considered to be juvenilesmay avoid criminal prosecution on account oftheir age.Economics and marketingThe economics of aging are also ofgreat import. Children and teenagers have little money of theirown, but most of it is available for buying consumer goods. Theyalso have considerable impact on how their parents spendmoney.Young adults are an even more valuable cohort.They often have jobs with few responsibilities such as a mortgageor children. They do not yet have set buying habits and are moreopen to new products.The young are thus the central target ofmarketers. Television isprogrammed to attract the range of 15 to 35 year olds. Movies are alsobuilt around appealing to the young.Health care demandMany societies in the rich world, e.g.Western Europe and Japan, have aging populations. While the effectson society are complex, there is a concern about the impact onhealth care demand. The large number of suggestions in theliterature for specific interventions to cope with the expectedincrease in demand for long-term care in aging societies can beorganized under four headings: improve system performance; redesignservice delivery; support informal caregivers; and shiftdemographic parameters.However, the annual growth in national healthspending is not mainly due to increasing demand from agingpopulations, but rather has been driven by rising incomes, costlynew medical technology, a shortage of health care workers andinformational asymmetries between providers and patients.Even so, it has been estimated that populationaging only explains 0.2 percentage points of the annual growth ratein medical spending of 4.3 percent since 1970. In addition, certainreforms to Medicare decreased elderly spending on home health careby 12.5 percent per year between 1996 and 2000. This would suggestthat the impact of aging populations on health care costs is notinevitable.Impact on PrisonsAs of July 2007, medical costs for a typicalinmate might run an agency around $33 per day, while costs for anaging inmate could run upwards of $100. Most DOCs report spendingmore than 10 percent of the annual budget on elderly care. That isexpected to rise over the next 10-20 years. Some states have talkedabout releasing aging inmates early.Cognitive effectsSteady decline in many cognitiveprocesses are seen across the lifespan, starting in one's thirties.Research has focused in particular on memory andaging, and has found decline in many types of memory withaging, but not in semanticmemory or general knowledge such as vocabulary definitions,which typically increases or remains steady. Early studies onchanges in cognition with age generally found declines inintelligence in the elderly, but studies were cross-sectionalrather than longitudinaland thus results may be an artefact of cohort rather than a true exampleof decline. Intelligencemay decline with age, though the rate may vary depending on thetype, and may in fact remain steady throughout most of thelifespan, dropping suddenly only as people near the end of theirlives. Individual variations in rate of cognitive decline maytherefore be explained in terms of people having different lengthsof life.Coping and well-beingPsychologistshave examined copingskills in the elderly. Various factors, such as socialsupport, religionand spirituality,active engagement with life and having an internal locus ofcontrol have been proposed as being beneficial in helpingpeople to cope with stressful life events in later life. Socialsupport and personal control are possibly the two most importantfactors that predict well-being, morbidity and mortality in adults.Other factors that may link to well-being and quality oflife in the elderly include social relationships (possiblyrelationships with pets as well as humans), and health.Individuals in different wings in the sameretirementhome have demonstrated a lower risk of mortality and higheralertness and self-rated health in the wing where residents hadgreater control over their environment, though personal control mayhave less impact on specific measures of health.ReligionReligion has been an important factor used by theelderly in coping with the demands of later life, and appears moreoften than other forms of coping later in life. Religiouscommitment may also be associated with reduced mortality, thoughreligiosity is amultidimensional variable; while participation in religiousactivities in the sense of participation in formal and organizedrituals may decline, itmay become a more informal, but still important aspect of life suchas through personal or private prayer.Self-rated healthSelf-ratings of health, the beliefs inone's own health as excellent, fair or poor, has been correlated withwell-being and mortality in the elderly; positive ratings arelinked to high well-being and reduced mortality. Various reasonshave been proposed for this association; people who are objectivelyhealthy may naturally rate their health better than that of theirill counterparts, though this link has been observed even instudies which have controlled for socioeconomic status,psychological functioning and health status. This finding isgenerally stronger for men than women,Societal impactSocietal aging refers to the demographicaging of populations and societies. Cultural differences inattitudes to aging have been studied.Emotional improvementGiven the physical and cognitivedeclines seen in aging, a surprising finding is that emotionalexperience improves with age. Older adults are better at regulatingtheir emotions and experience negativeaffect less frequently than younger adults and show a positivityeffect in their attention and memory. The emotionalimprovements show up in longitudinal studies as well as incross-sectional studies, and so cannot be entirely due to only thehappier individuals surviving.TerminologyThe concept of successful aging can be tracedback to the 1950s, and popularised in the 1980s. Previous researchinto aging exaggerated the extent to which health disabilities,such as diabetes orosteoporosis, couldbe attributed exclusively to age, and research in gerontology exaggerated thehomogeneity of samples of elderly people.Successful aging consists of three components:Low probability of disease or disability;High cognitive and physical function capacity;Active engagement with life.A greater number of people self-report successfulaging than those that strictly meet these criteria. The terms"healthy aging"% of dead yeast cells % of live cells (with the"elixir of life")Measure of ageThe normal point of time from where tomeasure the age of a human being is from birth. Age in prenataldevelopment is normally measured in gestationalage, taking the last menstruation of the womanas a point of beginning. Alternatively, fertilizationage, beginning from fertilization can betaken.Age is often rounded downward to an integer,where the time of birth is taken to have been 0:00 (in other words,the number of days is first rounded upward, before roundingdownward to whole years). Thus the age range 4-11 is until the 12thbirthday.See alsoAdultismAgingbrainAgingResearch CentreBiodemographyBiologicalimmortalityCalorierestrictionGerontologyLifeexpectancyList of life extension-related topicsLongevityMaturity(psychological)Memory andagingMichaelRistowMitohormesisPopulationagingRetirementSenescenceTheGrim Reaper GeneYouthbulgeNotesReferencesBass, S.A. (2006). Gerontological Theory: The Search for theHoly Grail. The Gerontologist, 46, 139-144.Bath, P.A. (2003). Differences between older men and woman inthe Self-Rated Health/ Mortality Relationship. The Gerontologist,43 387-94Charles, S.T., Reynolds, C.A., Gatz, M. (2001).Age-related differences and change in positive and negative affectover 23 years. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 80,136-151.Fentleman, D.L., Smith, J. Peterson, J. (1990).Successful aging in a postretirement society. In P.B. Baltes andM.M. Baltes (Eds.).Successful aging: Perspectives from theBehavioural Sciences. pp50-93Mather, M., Carstensen, L. L. (2005). Aging and motivatedcognition: The positivity effect in attention and memory. Trends inCognitive Sciences 9, 496-502. PDFMasoro E.J. Austad S.N.. (eds.): Handbook of the Biologyof Aging, Sixth Edition. Academic Press. San Diego, CA, USA, 2006.ISBN 0-12-088387-2Moody, Harry R. Aging: Concepts and Controversies. 5th ed.California: Pine Forge Press, 2006.Rowe, J.D. Kahn, R.L. (1987). Human aging: Usual andsuccessful. Science, 237, 143-149Rowe, J.D. Kahn, R.L.(1997). Successful aging. TheGerontologist, 37 (4) 433-40Strawbridge, W.J., Wallhagen, M.I. Cohen, R.D. (2002).Successful aging and well-being: Self-rated compared with Rowe andKahn. The Gerontologist, 42, (6)Zacks, R.T., Hasher, L., Li, K.Z.H. (2000). Human memory.In F.I.M. Craik T.A. Salthouse (Eds.), The Handbook of Agingand Cognition (pp. 293-357). Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.External linksThe University ofSouthern California Davis School of GeronbtologyThe arrowof time - a photo-essay of a family aging, with yearlyportraits over 30 yearsNational Institute on Aging(U.S.)septuagenarian in Arabic: شيخوخةseptuagenarian in Bulgarian: Стареенеseptuagenarian in German: Alterungseptuagenarian in French: Vieillissementseptuagenarian in Hebrew: הזדקנותseptuagenarian in Dutch: Veroudering(mens)septuagenarian in Japanese: エイジングseptuagenarian in Portuguese:Envelhecimentoseptuagenarian in Russian: Старениечеловекаseptuagenarian in Swedish: åldrandeseptuagenarian in Tamil: முதுமைப்படுதல்septuagenarian in Thai: อายุseptuagenarian in Ukrainian: Старіннялюдиниseptuagenarian in Chinese: 老化Synonyms, Antonyms and RelatedWordsFather Time, L, Methuselah, Nestor, Old Paar, Sexagesima, boxcar, boxcars, centenarian, dotard, dozen, duodecimo, eighty, elder, eleven, fifteen, fifty, five and twenty, fortnight, forty, four and twenty, fourscore, fourscore and ten,fourteen, gaffer, geezer, golden-ager, gramps, grandfather, grandsire, graybeard, half a hundred,long dozen, ninety,nonagenarian,octogenarian, oldchap, old codger, old dog, old duffer, old geezer, old gent, oldgentleman, old man, old party, old-timer, older, oldster, pantaloon, patriarch, presbyter, quindecennial, quindecim, quindecima, quindene, score, senior citizen, seventy, sexagenarian, sexagenary,sexagesimo-quarto, sixteen, sixteenmo, sixty, sixty-four, sixty-fourmo,teens, the quiet-voicedelders, thirteen,thirty-two, thirty-twomo, threescore, threescore andten, twelve, twelvemo, twenty, twenty-five, twenty-four,twenty-fourmo, two dozen, two weeks, twoscore, venerable sir,veteran

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