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This article examines the evidence for two propositions: that health and ability to function can often be sustained into advanced old age through interventions that (1) control risk factors among people already old and (2) improve lifelong health behaviors and life-styles starting with people currently still young. Beginning with a general model of age-related changes in health, function, and survival, the article shows how the interrelationship between the three varies between two extreme types of diseases: the fast, lethal type, where death occurs early and rapidly, with few years spent in unhealthy or disabled conditions; and the slow, degenerative type, where prolonged survival allows for added years in unhealthy or disabled conditions. Since this latter type is predominant among older people in the United States today, interventions to prevent morbidity and functional loss are of critical importance. The need for an improved research base to guide such interventions is strongly urged.

Based on a review of the literature, evidence for two propositions is examined: that health & ability to function can often be sustained into advanced old age through interventions that: (1) control risk factors among people already old; & (2) improve lifelong health behaviors & lifestyles among people currently still young. Beginning with a general model of age-related changes in health, function, & survival, it is shown how the interrelationship between the three varies between two extreme types of diseases: the fast, lethal type, where death occurs early & rapidly, with few years spent in unhealthy or disabled conditions; & the slow, degenerative type, where prolonged survival allows for added years in unhealthy or disabled conditions. Since this latter type is predominant among older people in the US today, interventions to prevent morbidity & functional loss are of critical importance & require an improved research base to guide them. 2 Tables, 3 Figures. HA

Executive summary 1. This report contains the main results of a survey of food-related lifestyle in Spain, based on a representative sample of 1000 Spanish households. 2. Generally speaking, Spanish food consumers are very interested in shopping for food and cooking. Compared with other European food consumers, however, they are also very conservative, both in their choice and use of food. 3. Spanish food consumers can be divided into five segments, which differ both in the way they use food and in the importance it has for their attainment of central life values. The segments can only to a small extent be described by means of demographic characteristics. 4. The adventurous food consumers constitute 20% of the population. These are involved food consumers who like both shopping for food and cooking, and who are constantly on the lookout for new products and recipes. They attach a lot of importance to the social role of food. 5. The conservative food consumers constitute 26% of the population. Security is an important purchasing motive for these food consumers, which is reflected in the fact that they only buy familiar products, and cook and eat food traditionally. Apart from this, they are not particularly interested in either shopping cooking. 6. The uninvolved food consumers constitute 16% of the population. These food consumers are neither interested in shopping, cooking, nor the quality of the food they eat, and food is not an important element in their lives. The most important purchasing criterion for these food consumers is that food should be easy to cook. 7. The rational food consumers constitute 26% of the population. These are highly involved food consumers who are both price conscious and check product information when they go shopping, and who generally attach a lot of importance to food quality. They have a practical-rational attitude to cooking and eating, while at the same time stressing the social importance of food. 8. The enthusiastic food consumers constitute 12% of the population. These food consumers have the strongest purchasing motives of all the segments. They put a lot of energy into shopping and cooking, both of which are highly planned. These food consumers go after high quality natural product keep a watchful eye on prices. 9. The enthusiastic food consumers, followed by the rational food consumers, care most about ecology, animal welfare and genetic engineering in connection with food. Including political considerations in purchasing decisions is most widespread among the uninvolved food consumers, however.

This paper addresses itself to the political dimension of the question of life-style (and of a particular model of development to achieve that life-style), which has lately acquired exceptional salience and is widely as well as hotly debated because, rooted as it is in the intolerably asymmetrical and inequitous structuring of the relationship between resources and groups of human beings, it has generated all-round conflict, both domestically (in the societies of the South) and internationally (between North and South and South and South), and is inexorably leading to a disastrous confrontation. It questions the prevailing belief, fostered no less by pressure than by blandishment and example, that development strategy is meant only for the underdeveloped unindustrialized South. It holds that it is even more pertinent for the overindustrialized maldeveloped North, which, having overfed on colonial exploitation, has become prisoner of a self-created cultural paradigm, and therefore needs to liberate itself by relearning that there can be neither freedom, self-fulfilment, nor peace without a measure of self-control. Because this process of relearning is not easy, it will require the help of pressure from the South in co-operation with sensitive and concerned individuals and groups in the North.