Sara Arber and Maria Evandrou (eds.)

Ageing, Independence and the Life Course.

Using a life course approach, which emphasises the importance of recognising the effects of different life experiences on different groups of individuals and the interlinkage between phases of the life course, the book explores the ways in which bases of structural advantage and disadvantage, such as housing, social class, ethnicity, health and disability, have cumulative impacts on the situation of older people. This sociological analysis of later life focuses on three issues:

• Independence - the concept of autonomy and importance the elderly attachment to these
• Perceptions of ageing - how they vary according to different life course
• Social structural constraints associated with the material resources of older people - the policy implications of adopting a life course perspective.

Jessica Kingsley, London, 1993.