Deck 3: Biological Aging and Health

Question 1

Secondary aging refers to age-related changes that ___________.

A)are universal in the species
B)result from disease,disuse,and abuse
C)that are intrinsic,coming from within the organism
D)that imply the ticking of a biological time clock

Answer 1

B

Question 2

Which of the following is NOT considered a stochastic theory of biological aging?

A)Wear-and-tear theory
B)Free radical theory
C)rate-of-living theory
D)Immune theory

Answer 2

D

Question 3

In the United States,life expectancy at birth________ from 1900 to the present.

A)has stayed the same
B)has decreased
C)has increased

Answer 3

C

Question 4

In the United States,life expectancy has ______ and life span has ______.

A)been increasing; stayed the same
B)stayed the same; been increasing
C)been decreasing; been increasing
D)stayed the same; been decreasing

Question 5

Which group of Americans has the lowest life expectancy at birth?

A)African American females
B)African American males
C)European American females
D)European American males

Question 6

Primary aging refers to age-related changes that ____________.

A)come from outside the organism
B)affect all members of the species
C)are attributable to lack of exercise
D)occur because of smoking and excessive use of alcohol

Question 7

With compression of morbidity,more and more people __________.

A)will be ill only immediately prior to death
B)will suffer from illness early in life but not later
C)will no longer suffer from illness at all
D)will suffer from illness throughout life

Question 8

__________ are the molecular fragments formed as a by-product of the body's metabolic processes that unite with other molecules and interfere with their functioning.

A)Telomeres
B)Collagen
C)Free radicals
D)Lipofuscin

Question 9

In the United States,female babies have ______ life expectancy at birth compared to male babies.

A)a shorter
B)a longer
C)the same

Question 10

Programmed theories of aging have more in common with secondary aging than they do with primary aging.

Question 11

When people are exposed to conditions of stress,their physiological responses are associated with an increase in the level of stress-related hormones.When the stressful conditions return to normal,the elevated hormone levels do too.A return to normal,or baseline,levels of stress hormones ______________.

A)takes more time for young adults than it does for older adults
B)takes the same amount of time for young and older adults
C)takes less time for young adults than it does for older adults

Question 12

Morbidity refers to ________,whereas mortality refers to ________.

A)illness; death
B)longevity; disease
C)length of life; quality of life
D)chronic illness; acute illness

Question 13

With regard to the life expectancy of Americans who reach the age of 65,men have fewer years left than women do.

Question 14

Compared to programmed theories of biological aging,stochastic theories are better able to explain how lifestyle factors affect an individual person's rate of aging and chances of living a long life.

Question 15

Human life span _______________.

A)has increased since 1900
B)has decreased since 1900
C)has stayed the same since 1900

Question 16

Genetic make-up can fully account for how long a person will live.

Question 17

The term "rectangular survival curve" means that ____________.

A)the life span of the human species is increasing every decade
B)diseases such as AIDS cut life off at an early age for a significant proportion of the population
C)we now have the knowledge to extend human life indefinitely
D)life expectancy is approaching life span for a larger proportion of the population

Question 18

Compared to rats on unrestricted diets,rats fed a diet nutritionally adequate diet but a reduced number of calories ______________.

A)look less sleek but live the same amount of time
B)look more sleek but live the same amount of time
C)look less sleek but die earlier
D)look more sleek and have greater longevity

Question 19

Some researchers think that ______,which are protective caps at the tail ends of chromosomes located in each cell,lose some of their length.When they become too short the cell cannot divide any longer,and this could affect the longevity of the organism.

A)collagen
B)telomeres
C)cross-links
D)lipofuscin

Question 20

Obesity has become a public health issue in the United States,but,fortunately,it is extremely rare in adults ages 65 and older.

Question 21

Men who reach the ninth decade of life are often better off mentally and physically than women are.

Question 22

Tucker and her colleagues studied the relationship between marital status at midlife and longevity in a sample of men and women in the Terman Life-Cycle longitudinal study initiated in 1921.They found that _______________.

A)those who had never married had a higher mortality risk than those who were married
B)those married to the same person at midlife years had a lower mortality risk than those married more than once
C)those who were separated or divorced at midlife had a higher mortality rate than those who were married
D)marital status at midlife had no relationship to mortality risk

Question 23

Which disease is associated with high blood glucose levels and can lead to complications such as stroke and blindness?

A)Arthritis
B)Osteoporosis
C)Diabetes
D)Cancer

Question 24

Which of the following is the best example of an activity of daily living (ADL)?

A)Shopping
B)Bathing
C)Cooking
D)Driving

Question 25

Reserve capacity is the extra capacity needed when stressful or demanding situations require more than the normal capacity.With increasing age,the level of this reserve capacity __________.

A)is lower
B)is higher
C)stays the same

Question 26

As age increases from middle to older adulthood,the volume of the brain _____.

A)increases
B)remains stable
C)decreases

Question 27

According to findings from the Nun Study,it is possible to predict longevity on the basis of the level of positive emotional expression found in autobiographies that the nuns wrote when they were entering the convent as young adults.

Question 28

According to the Scaffolding Theory of Aging and Cognition (STAC),the brain cannot adapt to the neural changes that occur with aging and thus shows greater and greater slippage in functioning as time goes by.

Question 29

Which of the following is the leading cause of death for people age 65+ in the United States?

A)Heart disease
B)Diabetes
C)Alzheimer's disease
D)Acute infectious diseases

Question 30

Compared with the brains of old rats that live in standard cages with little stimulation,the brains of old rats that live in a complex toy-filled environment ___________.

A)have more extensive dendritic branching of neurons.
B)have the less extensive dendritic branching of neurons.
C)have the same amount of dendritic branching of neurons.

Question 31

Harris surveyed adults from a wide range of ages on their attitudes toward the use of age concealment techniques such as coloring hair or getting a facelift.Harris found that the people in her survey were least likely to be favorably viewed when such techniques were used by _______.

A)men
B)women
C)themselves
D)They were equally disapproving of all of the above

Question 32

Which of the following is the best example of an instrumental activity of daily living (IADL)?

A)Bathing
B)Eating
C)Dressing
D)Cooking

Question 33

Deterioration of the bone structure (brittle and porous bones) is found most commonly in________,who suffer in great numbers from ______.

A)Hispanic American women; rheumatoid arthritis
B)African American men; atherosclerosis
C)Native American men; bone marrow disease
D)European American women; osteoporosis

Question 34

According to the Scaffolding Theory of Aging and Cognition (STAC),__________.

A)the extent of scaffolding in the brain is not affected by environmental factors
B)scaffolding in the brain compensates for age-related decline in the brain's neural circuitry
C)new circuitry resulting from scaffolding is commonly associated with a greater degree of differentiation in brain activation
D)All of the above

Question 35

The build-up of plaque that can restrict blood flow is called __________.

A)osteoporosis
B)rheumatoid arthritis
C)atherosclerosis
D)Alzheimer's disease

Question 36

Which technique is used to monitor changes in brain activity as individuals engage in cognitive tasks?

A)CT scans
B)-rays
C)fMRI
D)Video monitoring

Question 37

One study described in Chapter 3 found that individuals who have faster reaction times in their 50s live ______________ compared to individuals who have slower reaction times.

A)more years
B)fewer years
C)the same number of years

Question 38

Which area of the brain seems to be the most affected by the aging process as far as having tangles,plaques,and widened sulci?

A)The occipital lobe
B)The parietal lobe
C)The frontal lobe
D)All of the above are equally affected by the aging process.

Question 39

As a cause of death,diabetes is ______ among European American older adults than it is among African American older adults.

A)more frequent
B)equally frequent
C)less frequent

Question 40

"Terminal drop" specifically refers to the fact that ___________.

A)there is a decline in cognitive ability test scores prior to death
B)older adults often experience falls prior to death
C)older adults often experience a drop in blood pressure
D)some older adults experience a decline in life satisfaction

Question 41

What is reserve capacity? How does it change with increasing age?

Question 42

Describe how both nature and nurture relate to individual differences in longevity.

Question 43

Describe some of the changes that take place in the aging brain?

Question 44

How are programming and stochastic theories of biological aging different? Give an example of each and explain why it falls into the category it does.

Question 45

What is meant by life span? For humans,has it changed over the past number of decades?

Question 46

What is terminal drop?

Question 47

What is meant by life expectancy at birth and how has it changed in the United States from 1900 to the present time?

Question 48

Which of the following is true about Medicaid?

A)It is a federal health insurance program administered by individual states.
B)It is a means-tested health insurance program.
C)It covers lengthy nursing home stays in some cases.
D)All of the above.

Question 49

Describe any gender differences in life expectancy in the United States.

Question 50

What is the difference between primary aging and secondary aging?

Question 51

What does the rectangular survival curve signify about life expectancy,life span,and the compression of mortality?

Question 52

Explain the difference between Medicare and Medicaid.

Question 53

The federal health insurance program that covers most Americans as long as they are ages 65 and older is called _________.

A)Medicaid
B)Medicare
C)Welfare
D)Senior Citizen Health Access

Question 54

Distinguish between activities of daily living (ADL) and instrumental activities of daily living (IADL).