gerontology

IPA/ˌdʒerɒnˈtɒlədʒi/
KK[dʒˌɛrəntˈɑlədʒi]IPA/ˌdʒerənˈtɑːlədʒi/

gerontology — noun

1. an academic field that examines how people age — the bodily, mental, and social

1.nounC1
Definition

an academic field that examines how people age — the bodily, mental, and social changes that come with growing older, and how to care for elderly people.

Example

Devika earned a master's degree in gerontology before joining a hospital in Mumbai.

degree in gerontology — academic field collocation

Researchers in gerontology study why some adults stay sharp into their nineties while others decline early.

researchers in gerontology — typical subject phrasing

Common collocations
  • study gerontology
  • research in gerontology
  • specialize in gerontology
  • gerontology program
  • gerontology department
Synonyms
  • geroscience

    narrower — focuses on the biology of aging only

  • aging studies

    more informal, often used in humanities contexts

Grammar Patterns

the study of gerontology

specialize in gerontology

Usage Note

Uncountable; rarely used with an article unless naming a specific program (e.g. 'the gerontology program at Yale'). Distinguish from 'geriatrics', which is the medical specialty treating elderly patients — gerontology is broader and includes social and psychological aspects.

Common Mistakes

She is a gerontology.
She is a gerontologist.
'gerontology' is the field; the person is a 'gerontologist'.
He works in geriatrics and gerontology, which mean the same thing.
Geriatrics treats illnesses in older patients; gerontology studies aging broadly.
the two are related but not interchangeable.

Word family

  • gerontologist
    nounC1
  • gerontological
    adjectiveC2

Synonym discussion

Sense: noun/1

Gerontology, geriatrics, and geroscience all concern old age but cover different ground. Gerontology is the broadest term: it studies aging from biological, psychological, and social angles, asking how people change as they grow older and how society can support them. Geriatrics is the clinical medical specialty that diagnoses and treats illnesses in elderly patients — a geriatrician works with individual people in a hospital or clinic, while a gerontologist may be a researcher, social worker, or teacher who never sees a patient. Geroscience is the newest of the three and focuses narrowly on the biological mechanisms of aging at the cellular and molecular level. A simple test: a study on loneliness among retirees is gerontology; prescribing medicine to an 80-year-old with arthritis is geriatrics; sequencing genes that govern lifespan in mice is geroscience.

gerontology ↗geriatrics ↗geroscience

Etymology

GreekNew LatinEnglish

Coined in the early 1900s from Greek 'gerōn' (old man) plus '-logy' (the study of). The American biologist Élie Metchnikoff is usually credited with popularizing the term in 1903 when arguing that old age deserved scientific attention as its own field rather than being treated only as the absence of youth.