To What Age Do Japanese People Wish to Live?: The Impact of Age Stereotypes

Abstract

The images we have concerning aging and older people influence our health, well-being, and longevity; however, we do not know which of its aspects (e.g., health, appearance, and personality) positively or negatively affect us. Therefore, to clarify the impact of images of aging on our desire to live long, which impacts our healthy behavior, we conducted an internet survey targeting 1,000 people aged between 30 and 75 years old in Japan in 2018. We tested the following five hypotheses: 1) Respondents who are interested in interacting with older people wish to live longer than those who do not; 2) Respondents who have a positive stereotype about physiological traits of older people wish to live longer than those who do not; 3) Respondents who have a positive stereotype about social relations among older people wish to live longer than those who do not; 4) Respondents who have a positive stereotype about the functioning of older people wish to live longer than those who do not; 5) Respondents who have a positive stereotype about the functioning of older people are likely to engage in healthy behavior and perceive better subjective health than those who do not, which positively affects the age they wish to live to. As a result, we found that only 70–75-year-old participants who had positive images of social relations in old age tended to express a wish to live longer. However, other aspects of images of aging such as appearance, personality, and biological traits did not affect such desire. We conclude that the influence of aging images on the desire to live long may be less apparent among Japanese than other cultures. It is possible that Japanese people are less likely to internalize aging images regarding old age.