Geropsychology Across Europe

Europe is aging. European countries currently have the highest proportions of older people in the world and will remain societies of long life over the next decades. Although this process may be less pronounced in some countries, due to a continuing decreasing fertility rate and a continuously increasing life expectancy the general trend shows a clear disproportion of the younger to the older generations especially in the West European countries. Recent extrapolations by Eurostat predict that there will be a dramatic increase of the “old old” above 80 years within the next 15 years, while the proportion of persons within the active age range between 15 to 64 years will decrease. Aging also has a remarkable gender specificity, the majority of very old people being women. These circumstances challenge societies on several dimensions, not the least with respect to the sustainability of public resources. Moreover, Europe has to simultaneously adapt to the challenges and demands of globalization, adding a further dynamic: the notion of resource fairness and distribution of resources. These challenges are not unknown, and several European countries are now focusing on developing “aging policies” and on the necessity of intergenerational solidarity. For instance, this is indicated by the fact that the year 2012 has been designated the “European Year for Active Ageing and Solidarity between Generations.” Parallel to this, geropsychology and geriatrics has become more and more prominent in national public discourses. Clearly, such demands require more effort to be invested in how the lives and health of older adults can be improved. This involves new challenges to the applied behavioral and medical sciences, requiring greater attention on how to organize intervention, nonpharmaceutical treatments, therapy, and higher education in psychogerontological fields of work. In fact, we believe that greater expertise and knowledge in geropsychology will be necessary for all fields of aging research and practice. The present issue of GeroPsych starts with instructive reports on intervention approaches and research in geropsychology across Europe describing new trends and providing insights into a flourishing field from various national perspectives. Stepankova and colleagues report on evaluation results of a memory training study from the Czech Republic. Schindler and colleagues investigate the extent to which perceived knowledge of dementia is associated with lower caregiver burden in a German sample of dementia caregivers. Despot Lucanin and coauthors from Croatia investigate who changes of subjective health are associated with objective physical and mental health over time. Fernandez-Ballesteros and Schettini evaluate university programs for older adults in Spain. The second section of this special issue includes four national reports giving an overview of the developments, research, and education in the field of geropsychology in Austria (Auer & Gatterer), the Czech Republic (Stepankova et al), Germany (Wurm & Tesch-Romer), and Spain (Santacreu Ivars). All papers shed new light on the multifacetedness, breadth and productivity of geropsychological work and research found in many European countries. Of course, we are aware that there is much more to report than one special issue can capture. Consequently, we are sure that this special issue is only one of many yet to come.