We define aging as a characteristic deterioration in one (or more) observable attributes of an
organism that typically occurs during later life. With this narrow functional definition, we gain …

The central premise of this chapter is that that there is no single fundamental cause of
healthy aging but rather a multiplicity of factors working together to facilitate optimal …

Understanding the phenomenon of health is crucial for ageing research since there is often
an implicit view on what constitutes health and how to measure it. We provide some …

In this chapter we review theories on the psychological dynamics of person–environment
relations as people age. The chapter begins with an introduction to the issue of aging in …

The mean age of the human population is steadily increasing in many areas around the
globe, a phenomenon with large social, political, economic and biological/medical …

The negative conceptualization of aging pervades most societies and can be seen implicitly
and explicitly across many levels and contexts of society. However, there is substantial …

Answering the question as to why we age is tantamount to answering the question of what is
life itself. There are countless theories as to why and how we age, but, until recently, the very …

Although the evolutionary theories of aging are quite well established, our knowledge about
how we age is still very limited. The abundance and heterogeneity of available mechanistic …

Debates in fields studying the biological aspects of aging and longevity, such as
biogerontology, are often split between 'anti-aging'approaches aimed largely at treating …

The chapter starts by describing aging in terms of its underlying physiology, moving from the
level of cells to organs and the organism as a whole. After a description of cell damage and …