In a completely between subjects design 80 male and 80 female undergraduates evaluated targets which were male or female and 25, 45, 65, or 85 years old, on the Aging Semantic Differential (ASD; Rosencranz & McNevin, 1969). Findings indicated that older targets were rated less positively than younger targets on two of the three ASD dimensions and that Target Age × Target Sex × Subject Age interactions were significant for two of the dimensions. These results replicate the target age (between subjects) effects reported by O'Connell and Rotter (1979) but not those which involved target sex (within subjects) and subject sex. It was concluded that a) subject sex and target sex affect perceptions of targets of different ages elicited from young subjects and b) between subjects versus within subjects designs produce different characterizations of such targets.

The “Facts on Aging Quiz” developed by Erdman Palmore has been extensively utilized as a brief, reliable, and easily administered test of factual knowledge on aging. This paper describes the applicability of the quiz in the Canadian context, and provides documentation for quiz items. Potential problems of misinterpretation of items relating to the rate of institutionalization and income levels, are noted. The paper also compares levels of knowledge and areas of misinformation among a sample (n=585) of undergraduates, university faculty, and health care professionals. The usefulness of the quiz in identifying differences in knowledge levels, is confirmed.

A partial evaluation of the comprehensive home care and home aid policy of the Ministry of Social Affairs (MAS) of Quebec was undertaken. Three different home care and/or home aid programs serving three urban catchment areas were compared for this purpose. Two of these programs offer comprehensive home care and home aid programs, while the third one offers nursing services at home only. One hundred clients from each program were interviewed at their admission and six months later. Three random samples of elderly from each of the catchment areas were also drawn to take into account local characteristics in the comparison of the clienteles. The study has shown that 1) the three clienteles do not differ except on a few variables. These differences are not systematically related to the type of program (comprehensive/nursing only). 2) That the clients who, on admission, have the profile closest to the client profile established by MAS, were among those that the interviewers could not find for the second interview. And, 3) a comparison of the clients of three programs (on living arrangements, functional impairments and chronic illness), with that of a random subsample of the elderly population, have shown that the former have a higher probability than the latter to wish to leave home. Thus the two comprehensive home care programs seem to experience difficulties in reaching the goals that the ministerial policy has set forth for them.

Responses to a Life Events Schedule were obtained from 408 elderly respondents at both phases of an 18-month longitudinal investigation. Sixteen items were identified with an incidence exceeding 5% at both phases. These items were found to be structurally unrelated. Temporal stability coefficients that were statistically significant, but generally of low magnitude, were obtained for a greater proportion of the usual stressors than for the less frequently endorsed items. The reasons for stability were suggested to be multifarious. Statistically significant correlations with happiness were obtained for few stress items. The items exhibiting correlations at both phases were associated with high incidences, and the direction of the correlations varied with the direction of stress (i.e., positive or negative).

The potential role of physical activity in the primary, secondary, tertiary and quarternary treatment of disease is examined with particular reference to the health care needs of the elderly. Areas requiring further research are stressed. On present evidence, it would appear likely that enhanced physical activity could make a useful contribution to the containment of health care expenditures; however, it still has to be established how far the gains of physical condition and resultant improvements of health status that are seen in younger individuals could be realized by the various categories of geriatric patient.