Young People's Perceptions of Adults1

T N GENERAL, behavioral scientists maintain *- that the values, attitudes, and beliefs which are internalized in childhood remain in some form throughout life (e.g., Newcomb, 1960; Thompson, 1962). Thus, the self-concept of the young, middle-aged, or elderly adult is attributed in large part to his early experiences. In the same fashion, the perception of roles entered into in maturity is based in part upon early learning regarding these roles. It would seem then that the consideration of the elderly and the aging process should include the feel-ings and attitudes of young people toward different adult age groups, since these feelings are likely to influence future roles. To date, the most extensive research efforts in the study of attitudes toward older people have come from Tuckman and Lorge (1953), who investigated the attitudes of a young adult sample toward old age by a questionnaire con-sisting of stereotypes and common misconcep-tions of old people. Their fundamental hypoth-esis was that, since old people are expected to play a decreasingly active role in life, these cultural expectations foster stereotyped ideas about old age roles. The responses indicated that the Ss viewed old age as a time of life characterized by eco-nomic insecurity, loneliness, resistance to change, poor health, and failing mental and physical powers. It was also quite evident from their data that the contemporary social en-vironment of old people is not seen as con-ducive to feelings of adequacy, adjustment, usefulness, or security. Several subsequent ad-ministrations of this scale have reconfirme