ABSTRACT
This chapter provides an overview of research on aging and consumption. It focuses on the distinct theoretical perspectives that implicate a triumvirate of agents and institutions including elderly consumers, family, and the market, either separately or together, in aging and consumption phenomena, and provides specific directives for future research. The chapter reviews distinct theoretical perspectives, changes in research topics, in units of analysis, and in family, market and medical contexts over time. It also explores the intricate interrelations between consumption and aging in highlighting socio-cultural, physiological, and psychological perspectives; generational versus cohort categorical priorities; and third and fourth age distinctions. The chapter closes with future directions regarding the growing importance and challenges of disentangling the effects of aging people on consumption, and conversely, the increasingly pervasive aspects of consumer culture on understandings and treatments of aging, with emphases on intersectionalities of experience, market mediations, and social interventions.
