Metacognitions of Beliefs about Aging in Four Cultural Contexts

Culturally specific beliefs about aging and aged people affect the behaviour, performance and experience of elderly people. In our study we focused on how elderly people perceive their role in society, how society thinks they should behave and what is expected of them in society. From each of our four research samples (Czech republic, Germany, Hong Kong, China, and Cameroon) we selected people (N=15x4) who self-rated high on Erikson´s based Ego integrity scale (Ryff and Heincke, 1983) and analysed their Life story interview (McAdams, 1995) in which we explicitly ask the aforementioned questions. Results suggest differences in narratives of highly integrated participants in our four cultural contexts, especially in the questions of generativity and the category of “behaviour as a model to younger generations”. Results will be also discussed from the “accepting the past” perspective.