though it is usually accompanied by the feeling of love for the baby. How adults experience parenting is affected by different situations such as the number of children in the family, the availability of social support, and the happiness or unhappiness of the married couple. Death of a spouse or divorce creates a family structure in which a single parent either the mother or the father has to take up the responsibility of the children. In recent times, women are increasingly seeking employment outside the home thus creating another type of family in which both parents work.
The stressors when both parents are working are quite the same as of a single working parent, namely, taking care of children, their school- work, illness, and coping with workload at home and in the office, etc. Despite the stresses associated with parenting, it provides a unique opportunity for growth and satisfaction and is perceived as a way of establishing concern and guiding the next generation. Physical changes during middle ages are caused by maturational changes in the body. Though individuals may vary in the rate at which these changes occur, almost all middle- aged people notice gradual deterioration in some aspects of their physical functioning such as decline in vision, sensitivity to glare, hearing loss and changes in physical appearance (e.g., wrinkles, grey hair or thinning of hair, weight gain).
Do cognitive abilities change during adulthood? It is believed that some cognitive abilities decline with age while others do not. Decline in memory is more in tasks involving long-term memory than short-term memory. For example, a middle-aged person can remember the telephone number immediately after s/he has heard it but may not remember it so efficiently after a few days.
Memory tends to show greater decline, while wisdom may improve with age. Remember that individual differences exist in intelligence at every age and as not all children are exceptional, neither do all adults show wisdom. Old Age Just when “old age” begins, is not easy to determine. Traditionally, the age of retirement was linked to old age.
Now that people are