A person's tendency toward extraversion, agreeableness, neuroticism, conscientiousness, and openness, the Big Five personality traits, is more consistent (McCrae & Costa, 2003). Midlife adults become more agreeable, but decline in openness and neuroticism.
Agreeableness and Conscientiousness showed relatively gradual increases in absolute scores across the life span whereas Neuroticism showed relatively gradual decreases.
Among the "big five" personality traits, agreeableness and conscientiousness increase into middle age, while neuroticism declines, and extroversion and openness to experience do not change or decrease slightly.
Longitudinal studies reveal average changes during adulthood in the expression of some traits (e.g., neuroticism and openness decrease with age and conscientiousness increases) and individual differences in these patterns due to idiosyncratic life events (e.g., divorce, illness).
Conscientious-ness, a trait marked by organization and discipline, and linked to success at work and in relationships, was found to increase through the age ranges studied, with the most change occurring in a person's 20s.
Personality in younger adulthood is more 'malleable'
Unlike in those 30 and younger, neuroticism continued to decline into 2021 and 2022 for adults between the ages 30 and 64 and those older than 65. The other four traits declined less significantly for the middle age group but remained the same for older adults.
Researchers have found that conscientiousness increases through young adulthood into middle age, as we become better able to manage our personal relationships and careers. Agreeableness also increases with age, peaking between 50 to 70 years. However, neuroticism and extroversion tend to decline slightly with age.
Our sense of smell, or olfaction, decreases more with age, and problems with the sense of smell are more common in men than in women.
Verbal memory, spatial skills, inductive reasoning (generalizing from particular examples), and vocabulary increase with age until one's 70s (Schaie, 2005; Willis & Shaie, 1999). However, numerical computation and perceptual speed decline in middle and late adulthood (see Image 5.31. 2).
Midlife adults become more agreeable, but decline in openness and neuroticism. However, midlife is also viewed as a time of change.
Studies have demonstrated that Neuroticism and Extroversion decline with age, while Agreeableness and Conscientiousness increase.
Individual-level personality change was found over about three years at mid-life. Personality change was associated with changes in self-rated health. Increased agreeableness, conscientiousness, and openness related to better health. Decreased neuroticism predicted better health.
The preponderance of evidence from these studies shows that neuroticism, extraversion, and openness to experience tend to decline across the lifespan. Agreeableness tends to increase across the lifespan.
Across nations, Emotional Stability, Extraversion, Openness, Agreeableness, and Conscientiousness tended to increase from early to middle adulthood.
Neuroticism refers to the degree to which a person is anxious, irritable, temperamental, and moody. It is perhaps the only Big Five dimension where scoring high is undesirable. Neurotic people have a tendency to have emotional adjustment problems and habitually experience stress and depression.
The Big Five remain relatively stable throughout most of one's lifetime. They are influenced significantly by both genes and the environment, with an estimated heritability of 50%. They are also known to predict certain important life outcomes such as education and health.
While memorization skills and perceptual speed both start to decline in young adulthood, verbal abilities, spatial reasoning, simple math abilities and abstract reasoning skills all improve in middle age. Cognitive skills in the aging brain have also been studied extensively in pilots and air-traffic controllers.
The most common conditions that cause cognitive decline include Alzheimer's disease, Lewy-Body disease, Parkinson's disease, and frontotemporal degeneration (damage and loss of nerve cells in the brain).
Someone who is middle-aged may have to deal with illness, financial issues, career shifts, marital problems, divorce, death, and the early stages of mental or physical decline. This makes it difficult to build a midlife worth living, and it's not uncommon to experience an emotional or midlife crisis as a result.
Aging can affect all of the senses, but usually hearing and vision are most affected. Devices such as glasses and hearing aids, or lifestyle changes can improve your ability to hear and see.
Taste buds decrease in size and number and your sensitivity to each of the five tastes (sweet, salty, sour, bitter and umami) begins to decline. The sense of smell diminishes because there are fewer nerve endings and less mucus in your nasal cavity. Both senses impact our interest in eating and socializing.
Scientists have long known that our ability to think quickly and recall information, also known as fluid intelligence, peaks around age 20 and then begins a slow decline.
Researchers have found that for most people, their big five scores remain relatively stable throughout their life. Where there has been any shift, these are generally for the better. For example, agreeableness and conscientiousness increases slightly with age.
Personality characteristics do change, but not much. For example, many people become somewhat more agreeable as they get older, but this does not apply to everyone or at every stage of life.
Researchers have found that conscientiousness increases through young adulthood into middle age, as we become better able to manage our personal relationships and careers. Agreeableness also increases with age, peaking between 50 to 70 years. However, neuroticism and extroversion tend to decline slightly with age.