ABSTRACT
The increasing national attention to the problems of older persons has concentrated on such material questions as income, healthy housing, and recreation. While this emphasis is appropriate in that public opinion tends to focus on public solutions to problems, and these material problems are most directly susceptible to public or political solutions, the approach neglects the social-psychological problems characteristic of aging in American society. The latter problems are illuminated by interactionist concepts, as Ruth Cavan shows, and her analysis offers a basis for a realistic attack on these problems. This chapter picks up the life cycle where the last one left off. Although there are substantive similarities and differences in the transitions into the postparental and the elderly role, it is clear that the abstract process of socialization is the same regardless of the particular phase of the family cycle.
