The experience of growing old is not entirely universal. The images of older women in most literature are premised on the physical contrast between them and the younger women. As in the quotation above, young women are generally considered virginal, graceful and beautiful, unlike older women who are even thought of as bizarre. Such stereotypical body images reflect social prejudices. Deterioration, physical and otherwise, is associated with ageing and consequently older people are regarded as a liability in society.
Older women feel they are treated as nothing but obsolete living individuals, and they resent it.
Shameen Ahmad is a 19-year old from Afghanistan. Since Shameen does not speak English, questionnaires were first translated into Persian and the answers into English. Khumar Huseynova is a 25-year old medical doctor and member of the Azerbaijan Medical Association. Misumi Taeko works at the Department of Behavioural Science Faculty of Arts and Letters of Tohoku University in Japan. A young Nepali woman requested for her name and age to be withheld.