![]() Although the midlife crisis has often been dismissed as a myth or satirized in novels and films, the concept has persisted not only in stereotypical depictions of rebellion and infidelity at midlife, but also in research that has sought to explain the particular social, physical and emotional challenges of middle age. Post-war sociological and psychological studies of middle age regarded the midlife crisis as a manifestation of either biological or psychological change, as a moment in the life course when-perhaps for the first time-people felt themselves to be declining towards death. Following Jaques's work, the midlife crisis became a popular means of describing how-and why-men and women around the age of 40 became disillusioned with work, disenchanted with relationships and detached from family responsibilities. In 1965, the psychoanalyst and social scientist Elliott Jaques introduced a term, the ‘midlife crisis’, that continues to structure Western understandings and experiences of middle age.
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