Biological, social, felt age…
It is difficult to define an age from which we consider that a person becomes “old”. There are no objective criteria for this, says the company’s observation center : “The cessation of professional activity is a frequently used criterion: we then measure the weight of those aged 60 or 65 and over in the total population. The pronounced physical decline is more around the age of 75 or 80, when we enter the “fourth age”.
But an earlier retirement age and longer life expectancy have often made this criterion less relevant. And among those aged 60 and over, these are biological age (that of our body, and in particular the state of health) or the “felt” age (the one I think to see, which corresponds to my way of life…) who intervene to segment the population more finely, according to the subject observed (health? consumption? travel?).
The French see themselves on average as nine years younger than their real age. Gap that rises to twenty years after age 65.
By contrast, the youngest—tweens, teens, and young adults up to 20—tend to feel older than their age, by an average of two years, based on at the study of Denis Guiotlecturer in management at the University of Angers, who analyzed this discrepancy between real age and perceived age: subjective age.
Her work thus identifies the emergence of pre-seniors – they are around 52 years old – who bear no resemblance to the “50-year-old housewife”. They love rap music, comics, distant travels… and have more and more in common with their grandchildren.
