Social Problems: Community, Policy, and Social Action
Video and Multimedia
Video
Learning Objective: Explain how age is both a biological and social classification
Description: Frontline production on the best and worst of living longer. Stories of individuals, tough decisions, and common challenges.
Most people want to die at home, but only 25% do. Where are people’s lives ending?
Learning Objective: Explain how age is both a biological and social classification. Describe how the sociological perspectives address age, aging and inequality. Identify the causes of population aging.
Description: TED Talk on the theoretical possibility of living to 1000 through advances found in scientific research on metabolism.
Learning Objective: Describe how the sociological perspectives address age, aging and inequality
Description: Frontline: Can You Afford to Retire?
Segment Four: The sex appeal of 401k plans made them highly appealing, giving the worker more autonomy over their retirement funds. However it pushed the payment from the company to the worker, and has created a middle class without enough savings for retirement.
Learning Objective: Describe how the sociological perspectives address age, aging and inequality
Description: Promotion spot for the Center for Aging Services Technologies. Why we should use medical technology that could decrease the reliance of older people on crisis based medical care, using the internet to connect to health care providers.
Audio
Learning Objective: Explain how age serves as a basis for prejudice or discrimination
Description: NPR program on fertility help for older women challenges expectations about the age of mothers. Doctors respond to cases where older women sought medical assistance to establish a pregnancy, asking whether an age cut-off is appropriate or discrimination
Learning Objective: Identify the causes of population aging.
Description: What living healthily can do to your life expectancy, even for the elderly? The fastest growing segment of the U.S. population is 85 plus.
Learning Objective: Explain how age serves as a basis for prejudice or discrimination. Describe how the sociological perspectives address age, aging and inequality
Description: Shifts in employment market and economic turndowns lead to job loss, but older employees can have a more difficult time getting rehired due to ageism. This report focuses on women’s challenges.
Web Resources
Learning Objective: Identify the causes of population aging. Describe how the sociological perspectives address age, aging and inequality
Description: U.S. population pyramid
Learning Objective: Describe how the sociological perspectives address age, aging and inequality. Identify the causes of population aging.
Description: Nova (PBS) website with interview transcripts sounding the alarm over the economic and political implications of an aging population.
The problem of social isolation
Learning Objective: Explain how age serves as a basis for prejudice or discrimination. Describe how the sociological perspectives address age, aging and inequality.
Description: Seven of the health problems that have been associated with social isolation.
Isolation can be as bad for your health as smoking obesity and it affects the elderly disproportionally.
Attitudes about Aging Populations
Learning Objective:
Description: The aging of populations in some nations is faster than in the U.S. and the Pew report describes some of the concerns an aging population brings.
Learning Objective: Describe how the sociological perspectives address age, aging and inequality.
Description: A former domestic worker who spent 17 years caring for others, Young, 66, is now a national advocate for Domestic Workers Alliance, trying to get this work protected under U.S. labor laws. Young has organized over 15,000 workers, but approximately 2 million people are estimated to be employed as domestic workers, many who care for the elderly at home.