Wow! "Middle Age" sure is short lived, most people on here that just said middle age doesn't start until 45 or late fourties have also implied in the past 60+ as old or a senior citizen.
So does middle age only last 10 or 12 years.
I guess it depends on what you are applying it to. You mentioned looks. There are a lot of asian and blacks that appear younger than they are. Many Europeans and Hispanics look older by 40 they look 60, so appearance is not a good guage (imo). Life span of late 70s evenly divided by young/middle/old, would put you in middle age about 26/27.
Most of us don't like that! We change that by optimistic thinking. "I'm going to live until at least 90", so middle age starts later, but split evenly it still starts at 31.
That also seems to be the more acceptable for all ages. You're no longer referred to as young or youth after thirty and most accept 60/62 as beginning old age or senior. Some Neighborhoods and associations consider 55 as a senior citizen.
So I guess my short answer is, yep, you are middle aged.
Your absolutely right! I clearly stated divided evenly by the three most widely accepted designations, however if you want to add more categories such as infant, teen, just remember seniors are in the same situation. A 55 or 60 yo is in the same category as a 95 or 100 yo.
If you don't use average life span and let's say use 100 and divide it in to ten year groups 41 to 50 and 51 to 60 becomes your two middle groups. Call them what you want.
If you use 80 as TC did, he's right 40 is the middle but it doesn't last for just one year. So again use a ten year bracket and it becomes 35 to 45.
Use two brackets and you move from young to old. 1-40 young 41 on up old.
Most teens would move that to 30 and above are old.
So again it comes down to my third paragraph and "depends on what you are applying it to".
If we're just applying it to looks, I think you could still divide it by probably 4 major factors. Gene pool, environment, up keep, and actions. I've seen 20s that look and act 50, and 40s or 50s that look and act 20.
Maybe the answer is, " it whenever or whatever you want it to be.
Just my two cents here, but I think minors and adults should be separated before dividing them up further. Minors are already split up into infant/toddler/child/preteen/teen, so I see young/middle/old as describing adulthood. Middle aged follows young adult. If you’re splitting up adulthood into those three brackets, middle aged would be anywhere from 39-59 to 45-67, depending on how many years you’re using.
If you want to divide up the entire human lifespan, I think your idea of taking 100 years and dividing it up into 20 year segments makes the most sense. Kids 1-20, young adults 21-40, middle aged 41-60, old 61-80, and elderly 81+.
Good argument, however, by using 20 year groups and 100 year life span your putting very few people in your last group. Elderly.
There are variations, using your 5 groups, and average life span of 80, that could be used as well.
Eliminate the first 20 then divide the remaining 60 evenly. 15 year groups but that puts middle age starting at 36.
Divide 80 by the 5 groups evenly. Results in 16 year groups. I kind of like this one because it put 17 as young adult, which I think if you ask most 17-20yo they'd consider themselves young adults. However this would put MA at 33 and old starting at 49. You'll get a lot that won't accept that. I'm okay with it, and most people that say listen to the elderly aren't talking about listening to the 80+ they're normally talking just grandparents.
A compromise plan I like as well, would be use the 5 groups but use 18 years, I know that extends the life span back up to 90 but may more accurately work. YA starts at 19, MA at 37, OA at 55 and elderly at 73.
Just thoughts, btw I don't see much over 50 as MA by the time you hit 50 you are well on your way to being old. If retirement planning, savings, and retirement living has started taking up more time than where or what you're going to do with your life, you've entered OA.
If we’re trying to split ages into an even number of years, we can’t be concerned with how many people are in each group, and vice versa. If you want there to be the same number of people in each group, each group would have to get progressively larger as they get older. Which may be a viable way to do it(I’d have to see what those age groupings would actually look like, but I am intrigued by the idea), it’s just a different argument.
I would also suggest you may be putting too much emphasis on what teens think. You said in another post that teens think 30 and up is old, here you say 17 could be young adult because they consider themselves young adults…but I assure you very few people aged 33/34 and higher consider 33/34 or even 37 to be middle aged. Very few people aged 49/50 consider themselves old. They would also likely say they think young adulthood probably starts at more like 21/22 than 17 or 18. (Fun fact: legal adulthood doesn’t start until 19 in Alabama and several Canadian provinces, and it actually starts at 21 in Mississippi and Puerto Rico.)
I still think kids should be handled separately from adults, since childhood can and should be split into several categories of its own. That leaves you with adulthood, and I think people who have lived beyond the average human life expectancy probably should have their own special category too, since they’re outliers and it’s such a small number of people that covers such a large age range. It varies widely by country, but that’s about 80/81 in developed nations.
If you start at 21 and go to 80, that gives you 60 years to divide up, if you use young/middle/old then middle is 41-60.
You could also use four groups. Dividing 18-81 into four groups would be 18-33, 34-49, 50-65, and 66-81. But if the first group is young adults and the last two are middle age and old, what do you call the 34-49 group? Just adults? Childhood seems to have the same problem; there’s a range between toddler and preteen that doesn’t really have a name besides child, but that can refer to anybody in the bigger group.
Idk. Societal consensus seems to be middle aged is 45-65 and I’m fine with that…I could see 40-60, but I can’t see it being any younger, at least outside of the view of people who are very young.
I guess perspective just depends on your personal age and what group you see yourself in.
I'm most likely in middle age and pushing old age no matter how you divide it.
The original question was based on appearance. Personally imo, there is a big difference in most people's appearance between ages 31 and 39. Whether it's from dealing with kids, life experience, or what ever.
There is at least one IIN user that thinks life as an attractive female ends at 25, lol, I don't agree with that but if you go back and read her posts there does seem to be a consensus that a maturity factor does set in between 25 and 35. So a change I would say takes place. Accept it or not and call it what you want.
I'll still go back to what I said previously. Old age, imo, starts shortly after 50. To many things happen at that point that imply you are getting old.
Increase medical visits/needs, all those old sports injuries come back to haunt us, wrinkles, crow's feet around eyes, low T, sex drive M & F, menopause, grey hair, and yes I know some will say not me but the average person see these changes by late 40s or early 50s.
I've fought that old (over the hill) thing for now almost ten years. At 40 people threw an over the hill party for me. I said not yet back then, but by average life span of 80 you technically are on the down hill side, and I have to admit at 50 no matter how you look at it you have crossed the summit and are on the downward side.
I also, at 35, would have disagreed with being middle age, we all want to drag our feet from leaving our youth. However by 45 I could see I was fully in MA and now see old age is coming quick. I don't like that term 'old' now either I prefer to use senior and I'll accept that title of senior citizen sometime after 50 maybe at 50.
Your only as old as you feel, but as you get older you realize life is shorter than you think. I could support the use of just adult between 25 to 40 MA to 50 or 55 but senior or OA sould kick in by 55.
Not that we have anything to do with making any rules or changes. It just more IMO stuff.
Enjoy your day!
Okay for the record is 34 middle aged?
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Wow! "Middle Age" sure is short lived, most people on here that just said middle age doesn't start until 45 or late fourties have also implied in the past 60+ as old or a senior citizen.
So does middle age only last 10 or 12 years.
I guess it depends on what you are applying it to. You mentioned looks. There are a lot of asian and blacks that appear younger than they are. Many Europeans and Hispanics look older by 40 they look 60, so appearance is not a good guage (imo). Life span of late 70s evenly divided by young/middle/old, would put you in middle age about 26/27.
Most of us don't like that! We change that by optimistic thinking. "I'm going to live until at least 90", so middle age starts later, but split evenly it still starts at 31.
That also seems to be the more acceptable for all ages. You're no longer referred to as young or youth after thirty and most accept 60/62 as beginning old age or senior. Some Neighborhoods and associations consider 55 as a senior citizen.
So I guess my short answer is, yep, you are middle aged.
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hauntedbysandwiches
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Who said there’s only young/middle/old? That would put 25 year olds in the same age group as a one day old.
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darefu
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Your absolutely right! I clearly stated divided evenly by the three most widely accepted designations, however if you want to add more categories such as infant, teen, just remember seniors are in the same situation. A 55 or 60 yo is in the same category as a 95 or 100 yo.
If you don't use average life span and let's say use 100 and divide it in to ten year groups 41 to 50 and 51 to 60 becomes your two middle groups. Call them what you want.
If you use 80 as TC did, he's right 40 is the middle but it doesn't last for just one year. So again use a ten year bracket and it becomes 35 to 45.
Use two brackets and you move from young to old. 1-40 young 41 on up old.
Most teens would move that to 30 and above are old.
So again it comes down to my third paragraph and "depends on what you are applying it to".
If we're just applying it to looks, I think you could still divide it by probably 4 major factors. Gene pool, environment, up keep, and actions. I've seen 20s that look and act 50, and 40s or 50s that look and act 20.
Maybe the answer is, " it whenever or whatever you want it to be.
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Just my two cents here, but I think minors and adults should be separated before dividing them up further. Minors are already split up into infant/toddler/child/preteen/teen, so I see young/middle/old as describing adulthood. Middle aged follows young adult. If you’re splitting up adulthood into those three brackets, middle aged would be anywhere from 39-59 to 45-67, depending on how many years you’re using.
If you want to divide up the entire human lifespan, I think your idea of taking 100 years and dividing it up into 20 year segments makes the most sense. Kids 1-20, young adults 21-40, middle aged 41-60, old 61-80, and elderly 81+.
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darefu
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Good argument, however, by using 20 year groups and 100 year life span your putting very few people in your last group. Elderly.
There are variations, using your 5 groups, and average life span of 80, that could be used as well.
Eliminate the first 20 then divide the remaining 60 evenly. 15 year groups but that puts middle age starting at 36.
Divide 80 by the 5 groups evenly. Results in 16 year groups. I kind of like this one because it put 17 as young adult, which I think if you ask most 17-20yo they'd consider themselves young adults. However this would put MA at 33 and old starting at 49. You'll get a lot that won't accept that. I'm okay with it, and most people that say listen to the elderly aren't talking about listening to the 80+ they're normally talking just grandparents.
A compromise plan I like as well, would be use the 5 groups but use 18 years, I know that extends the life span back up to 90 but may more accurately work. YA starts at 19, MA at 37, OA at 55 and elderly at 73.
Just thoughts, btw I don't see much over 50 as MA by the time you hit 50 you are well on your way to being old. If retirement planning, savings, and retirement living has started taking up more time than where or what you're going to do with your life, you've entered OA.
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A couple quick things to consider:
If we’re trying to split ages into an even number of years, we can’t be concerned with how many people are in each group, and vice versa. If you want there to be the same number of people in each group, each group would have to get progressively larger as they get older. Which may be a viable way to do it(I’d have to see what those age groupings would actually look like, but I am intrigued by the idea), it’s just a different argument.
I would also suggest you may be putting too much emphasis on what teens think. You said in another post that teens think 30 and up is old, here you say 17 could be young adult because they consider themselves young adults…but I assure you very few people aged 33/34 and higher consider 33/34 or even 37 to be middle aged. Very few people aged 49/50 consider themselves old. They would also likely say they think young adulthood probably starts at more like 21/22 than 17 or 18. (Fun fact: legal adulthood doesn’t start until 19 in Alabama and several Canadian provinces, and it actually starts at 21 in Mississippi and Puerto Rico.)
I still think kids should be handled separately from adults, since childhood can and should be split into several categories of its own. That leaves you with adulthood, and I think people who have lived beyond the average human life expectancy probably should have their own special category too, since they’re outliers and it’s such a small number of people that covers such a large age range. It varies widely by country, but that’s about 80/81 in developed nations.
If you start at 21 and go to 80, that gives you 60 years to divide up, if you use young/middle/old then middle is 41-60.
You could also use four groups. Dividing 18-81 into four groups would be 18-33, 34-49, 50-65, and 66-81. But if the first group is young adults and the last two are middle age and old, what do you call the 34-49 group? Just adults? Childhood seems to have the same problem; there’s a range between toddler and preteen that doesn’t really have a name besides child, but that can refer to anybody in the bigger group.
Idk. Societal consensus seems to be middle aged is 45-65 and I’m fine with that…I could see 40-60, but I can’t see it being any younger, at least outside of the view of people who are very young.
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darefu
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I guess perspective just depends on your personal age and what group you see yourself in.
I'm most likely in middle age and pushing old age no matter how you divide it.
The original question was based on appearance. Personally imo, there is a big difference in most people's appearance between ages 31 and 39. Whether it's from dealing with kids, life experience, or what ever.
There is at least one IIN user that thinks life as an attractive female ends at 25, lol, I don't agree with that but if you go back and read her posts there does seem to be a consensus that a maturity factor does set in between 25 and 35. So a change I would say takes place. Accept it or not and call it what you want.
I'll still go back to what I said previously. Old age, imo, starts shortly after 50. To many things happen at that point that imply you are getting old.
Increase medical visits/needs, all those old sports injuries come back to haunt us, wrinkles, crow's feet around eyes, low T, sex drive M & F, menopause, grey hair, and yes I know some will say not me but the average person see these changes by late 40s or early 50s.
I've fought that old (over the hill) thing for now almost ten years. At 40 people threw an over the hill party for me. I said not yet back then, but by average life span of 80 you technically are on the down hill side, and I have to admit at 50 no matter how you look at it you have crossed the summit and are on the downward side.
I also, at 35, would have disagreed with being middle age, we all want to drag our feet from leaving our youth. However by 45 I could see I was fully in MA and now see old age is coming quick. I don't like that term 'old' now either I prefer to use senior and I'll accept that title of senior citizen sometime after 50 maybe at 50.
Your only as old as you feel, but as you get older you realize life is shorter than you think. I could support the use of just adult between 25 to 40 MA to 50 or 55 but senior or OA sould kick in by 55.
Not that we have anything to do with making any rules or changes. It just more IMO stuff.
Enjoy your day!
30 isn't middle aged..