Definition
The World Health Organization (WHO) defines active aging as “…the process of optimizing opportunities for health, participation and security in order to enhance quality of life as people age” (WHO 2002, p. 12). For many years, the WHO has emphasized healthy aging, primarily defined as aging without major pathologies. In the early 1990s, it has begun developing the concept of active aging, jointly with other governmental and nongovernmental organizations initiatives, offering a policy framework that emphasizes the link between activity, health, independence, and aging well. Active aging emerged as a more comprehensive concept than healthy aging, as it considers not only health indicators but also psychological, social, and economic aspects, which are to be looked at the community level, within gender and cultural perspectives.
Currently the WHO’s active aging concept leads the global policy...
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Paúl, C., Lopes, A. (2016). Active Aging. In: Pachana, N. (eds) Encyclopedia of Geropsychology. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-287-080-3_248-1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-287-080-3_248-1
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