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Social Cognition and Aging

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Encyclopedia of Geropsychology

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Social cognition refers to the processes through which people make sense of themselves and others to engage with their social context (Fiske and Taylor 2013). Social-cognitive research draws from models developed in cognitive psychology as a tool for understanding social functioning. A social-cognitive perspective is useful for enhancing our understanding of the aging process, particularly because of the extensive research literature documenting age-related changes in cognition (Salthouse 2012). The cognitive changes that emerge with age paint a complex picture of loss and gain, as some losses in cognitive functioning interact with some gains in knowledge or ability in other domains. Social-cognitive changes with age are made even more complex by the fact that motivational and emotional changes brought about by changes in life goals (Charles and Carstensen 2010) interact with changes in cognitive function to produce diverse patterns of responding.

Determinants of age-related...

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Correspondence to Elise K. Kalokerinos .

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Kalokerinos, E.K., von Hippel, W., Henry, J.D. (2017). Social Cognition and Aging. In: Pachana, N.A. (eds) Encyclopedia of Geropsychology. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-287-082-7_2

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