Gender roles and memory loss in old age: an exploration of linkages

A framework relating gender roles, role loss, and memory is presented. For the now-old woman, her identity has usually been defined by her roles within the family; other personal touchstones have been less legitimate. In old age, when key family roles dwindle, many women who have relied on their families as sources of identity are placed in an anomic situation, especially women with limited resources. When few meaningful social roles exist in the present, memory becomes increasingly important as a link to develop and maintain the self. It is proposed that, without meaningful present roles to frame one's past experience, memory is likely to be characterized by a high frequency of nonintegrated, relatively meaningless relationships, in turn leading to a narrowing of horizons and inability to take the role of the other. Episodic memories may decay since present events have no interest and generic memory becomes impaired. A case study approach is used to examine the relationship between self-preoccupation, group affiliation, object relations, and memory loss among three older working-class women. Their speech patterns, specifically pronoun use, were analyzed and support the postulate that a high frequency of self-references indicates memory loss and paucity of present experience.