Age Stereotypes Held Earlier in Life Predict Cardiovascular Events in Later Life

Abstract

When older individuals apply negative age stereotypes to themselves, they can adversely influence a wide range of outcomes (Levy, Slade, Kunkel, & Kasl, 2002). These outcomes include a greater cardiovascular response to stress and worse health behaviors, such as higher tobacco use (Levy, Hausdorff, Hencke, & Wei, 2000; Levy & Myers, 2004), both of which have been linked to the risk of cardiovascular events (Jiang et al., 1996).