ABSTRACT
The midlife transition or crisis has become a common term to explain a variety of behaviors and conflicts that occur in the years of middle adulthood. During middle age work not only provides an enormous source of satisfaction to men; it can lead to a great deal of stress as well. In young adulthood, leisure is influenced by desires for variety, autonomy, and sensory experience. D. J. Levinson saw the period around the 40-year mark as a link between early and middle adulthood. The adults in Vaillant's study began to reassess their past, break out of felt restrictions, come to terms with suppressed feelings about their parents, reorder attitudes about sexuality, and experience periods of despair and anger. C. Nydegger studied a number of middle-aged men and women of the middle class and found that there was little evidence for seeing this time as a crisis.
