Mrs Linette Rattigan 80 Years Old (My Grandmother) - Research Paper Example

This paper analyzes these benchmarks against the aging process in Mrs. Rattigan for the purposes of proving that she is welcoming old age. Aging is a process that is multidimensional and encompasses social, psychological, and physical or biological changes in a person (Lewis and Tam 103). In almost all the cultures in the world today, aging is measured chronologically either by numbers or by the number of events a person has experienced in his lifetime. The more a person can describe certain events in history, the more senior he is perceived to be.

In this case, Mrs. Rattigan can be proved to be aged since she boasts of having lived in the periods immediately after the Second World War. Biological, Psychological, and Social Benchmarks of Aging There are three benchmarks of aging that can be observed in Mrs. Rattigan, which are, biological, social, and psychological. From the social age perspective, it is required that a person’s social age should be in line with his actual age (Miller 39). The person’s level of maturity; which is reflected in his social age, should have grown with his actual age.

This should be manifested in how he freely interacts in social situations with people of his age, and how deals emotionally with them. To a greater extent, social norms direct age relevant-behavior more than biological rules do. For example, a social age benchmark suggests that it is not normal for an eighty-year-old to dress provocatively, or to smoke cigarettes, despite the fact that they are free to do so. Basing an argument with this view in mind, it can be asserted that socially constructed rules prevent involvement in certain deviant behaviors which are considered as going against what is appropriate for a specific age category (Miller 39).

Biological aging is determined by physiological alterations and it includes changes in the body’s physical structures as well changes in the performance of motor skills and other sensory awareness (Miller 513). These physiological changes include changes in the skin, hair, and nails among others. Changes in the skin take place over time, in view of the fact that with age; the skin usually loses its underlying fat reserve layers and oil glands. This causes the development of wrinkles and reduced elasticity of the skin.