Research shows that the activation of aging stereotypes has significant effects over older people’s performance across multiple domains. The significance of these results has promoted interventions to change ageist representations in society. However, little is known about the activation of the reversed “outcome-stereotype” link. Therefore, in this paper we examined whether outcome activation leads to the activation of the associated aging stereotype. Specifically, we tested whether older people’s (N = 30) navigation in a threatening virtual reality spatial environment increases the activation of the “doddering, but dear” aging stereotype (i.e., consistent with the stereotype content model’s proposition that older people are perceived to be warm but incompetent). Results showed, both with explicit and implicit measures, that the environment activates and reinforces negative age stereotypes. We discuss the implications that our findings have for theory and practice, and its further consequences for an aging population.

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Aging Stereotypes,virtual reality,ageist representations,threatening spatial environment

• Computer and Information Sciences - Natural Sciences
• Electrical Engineering, Electronic Engineering, Information Engineering - Engineering and Technology
• Psychology - Social Sciences
• Arts (arts, history of arts, performing arts, music) - Humanities