Summary
A variety of methodological desiderata for gerontological research are identified and discussed in the context of the developmental study of psychometric intelligence in old age. This area of research offers a good scenario because there is current controversy in data and theory involving the extent (onset, universality) of intellectual decrement in old age. It is argued that this dialectic is largely a reflection of growing recognition and application of novel methodological perspectives. A first set of methodological issues presented deal with proper assessment of intellectual behavior in older adults (problems of validity, of obtaining information on intraindividual variability and plasticity, and of separating factors of performance from those of competence). A second set of issues involves questions of developmental design aimed at valid identification of ontogenetic (intraindividual) life-span change and of developmental interindividual differences. These issues are discussed as they involve the use of cross-sectional, longitudinal, and cohort-sequential methodology. A third set of methodological issues relates to explanatory-causal work on intellectual aging and the role of intervention paradigms. As a framework for explanatory research, a multicausal model of influences on aging is presented. This model identifies three systems of influences (normative age-graded, normative history-graded, non-normative critical life events) which control the life-span development of intelligence. Such a multicausal and interactive view requires a set of methodologies which minimizes the role of chronological age as the prime carrier for causation. In addition, process-oriented intervention research is discussed which focuses explicitly on the study of the conditions for varying (differential) aging. During the last decade, emerging application of the methodological desiderata outlined has resulted in a major reevaluation of the traditional evidence on intellectual aging which had highlighted decline as the primary and universal characteristic. Although the available evidence is not yet rich enough to justify a precise conclusion, it appears that intellectual aging in current cohorts is much more plastic and heterogeneous than past research with limited methodologies (such as cross-sectional age comparisons with static youth-oriented measurement instruments) would have suggested. It is speculated that similar methodology-induced deficits in knowledge about psychological aging might exist also in other areas of gerontological research.
This chapter was completed while Paul B. Baltes was a Fellow at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences at Stanford, California. This fellowship was supported, in part, by a grant from the National Science Foundation (BNS 76-22943 Ao2). Grant support from the National Institute on Aging (5Ro1AG0040) for a project entitled “Cognitive Modiflability in Aging” to the Pennsylvania State University and Paul B. Baltes and Sherry L. Willis (co-investigators) is also acknowledged. Furthermore, a discussion with Matilda W. Riley regarding the multicausal model of influences proposed was helpful.
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Baltes, P.B., Willis, S.L. (1979). The Critical Importance of Appropriate Methodology in the Study of Aging: The Sample Case of Psychometric Intelligence. In: Hoffmeister, F., Müller, C. (eds) Brain Function in Old Age. Bayer-Symposium, vol 7. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-67304-7_12
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