This is the third volume on aging issued by the American Psychological Association. Once again a substantial amount of information has accumulated that can help to direct our thinking about psychological aging in the next decade. The present volume has multiple purposes : to summarize and put into perspective selected issues on the psychology of aging and to establish research directions for the 1980s; to identify what we now know and what we need to know about nine selected areas in the field of aging; and to provide a framework to guide the deliberations of the participants at two projected conferences on aging--the 1981 White House Conference on Aging, and the 1982 World Assembly on Aging. In attempting to fulfill these purposes I have aimed to present complementary and competing views from researchers and clinicians of different backgrounds. It is intended to serve as a sourcebook to supplement and complement existing literature for researchers, practitioners, clinicians, graduate and postgraduate students, as well as the professionals and the policymakers in the field of aging and allied sciences. Abstracts have been provided to make each chapter accessible to lay readers. Nine major areas of research in aging are explored in this volume : clinical issues, neuropsychological issues, psychophysiological issues, psychopharmacological issues, cognitive issues, stress and coping, environmental issues, interpersonal relations, and methodological issues. For each of these areas, one or more associate editors were directed to identify and review the outstanding issues, to integrate new and old theories and data, and to provide directions for the next steps to be taken by researchers in the 1980s. Most sections of the book were presented in a series of symposia held at the 87th annual meeting of the American Psychological Association in New York City, in September 1979. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2004 APA, all rights reserved).

The Committee on National Statistics and the Committee on Population, at the request of the NIA, convened a workshop in March 1996 to discuss data on the aging population that address the emerging and important social, economic, and health conditions of the older population. The purposes of the workshop were to identify how the population at older ages in the next few decades will differ from the older population today, to understand the underlying causes of those changes, to anticipate future problems and policy issues, and to suggest future needs for data for research in these areas. The scope of the workshop was broader than that of the 1988 CNSTAT report, including not only data on health and long-term care, but also actuarial, economic, demographic, housing, and epidemiological data needs for informing public policy.