Successful ageing, well-being and age identity: the case of athletes
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| Year of publication | 2024 |
| Type | Appeared in Conference without Proceedings |
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| Description | We generally do not associate sports and sports competition with older age. Moreover, in top-level sports, a person becomes “old” a few decades earlier than when we generally understand older age. At the same time, many sports are expanding the opportunities for participation at older ages in disciplines primarily designed for the young rather than disciplines explicitly created for older people. In my paper, I look at competitive sport as a specific area where age and older age are negotiated and viewed through a different lens than the usual one. I observe how this sporting optic of age interferes with and adjusts the ageing coping of athletes and their perception of themselves as (pre-)older people. To do so, I use data from in-depth interviews with men (aged 50-75) who participate in competitions in different sports disciplines. My sample is heterogeneous regarding the participants' sports biographies and motivations for participating in competitions, but sport seems to bring about a different perception of age identity. I discuss this specific lifestyle in the context of notions of 'successful' ageing and the well-being of older people. |
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