MARKETING APPROACH TO AGE-SPECIFIC PERIODIZATION IN THE INTERACTION WITH OLDER CONSUMERS

Abstract

The paper deals with the retrospective analysis of approaches to age-specific periodization of a human
life in the humanities, as a result of which it’s shown that despite the interests of researchers in various scientific
fields, at present the science hasn’t worked out a unified approach to determination of age limits of middle
age. Also, it’s shown that there are no general approaches in respect of evaluation of contents of the late
period of human life: in scientific works on psychology middle age is characterized from a positive and a
negative position. The authors indicate that the problem of objective characteristics of middle age periods is
caused by increasing differentiation of individuals owing to peculiarities of their development and conditions,
which influence this process. In the context of ageing of population, typical for the majority of countries and
regions of the world, there is a tendency towards spreading a positive perception of old age, which specifies
among other things changes in the way of living of older people. From the position of marketing in the interaction
with older consumers a key factor is not only determination of age limits of the segment, but also understanding
of the psychological state of an individual, which causes distinctiveness of his consumer behavior.
In order to differentiate consumers the authors suggest using a model of subjective age, which advantage
is a detailed view about person’s age from the position of his self-perception and behavior, and makes it
possible to take into account heterogeneity of the older consumers segment