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Life-course and life-span theoretical perspectives have important implications for gerontological studies. Both frameworks address patterns of change over time that inform our understanding of the process of aging. In considering health inequalities in later life, both life-course and life-span perspectives play an integral role in determining micro- and macrolevel influences on health and well-being in late life. In this chapter we consider the theoretical underpinnings of a life-long approach to health disparities, major themes in the life-course and life-span perspectives on aging, and cumulative inequalities and disparities on well-being and health.
Theoretically, there is now a broad consensus across many disciplines in the social (sociology, psychology, philosophy, economics, and demography) and medical sciences (biology, genetics, medicine, public health, and epidemiology) that in order to understand the phenomena of old age and aging processes it is important to take a life-span developmental and lifecourse perspective. Economists sometimes call this a life-cycle perspective. For some research disciplines, this idea has a long history, in others the history spans several decades, and for a few it remains counterintuitive. Historically, phases (e.g., childhood and old age) and experiences (e.g., education and health) of the life course were considered somewhat independently, because few believed that the normative events of early life had consequences for old age.
There are many similarities between the two perspectives, the most obvious one being that both advocate taking a long-term, multilevel, contextual, and dynamic view of aging. Life-span theories draw attention to the length of the life of an individual and to the idea that processes and trajectories of development and aging are lifelong (Lerner, 2002). Life-course theories, in contrast, differentiate between subgroups in society and focus on the social pathways that define the sequence of events, transitions, roles, and experiences in the lives of individuals (e.g., Alwin & Wray 2005; Settersen, 2007). While life-span researchers are interested primarily in understanding microlevel (endogenous) processes within the aging individual (e.g., the aging brain and mind), life-course researchers typically analyze the macrolevel (exogenous) processes that characterize the influence of groups, organizations, and institutions on the individuals within them.
Despite these differences in topical emphases and levels of measurement, in general, there is much concordance between the life-span and lifecourse perspectives. Together these perspectives present a comprehensive theoretical...