The significance of the project is defined by its contribution to the disciplines of gerontology, by testing experimental findings in a realistic field setting; to aging policy formation, by anticipating the impacts of current technological, demographic, and legal-political trends involving the longevity and status of the elderly in American society; to urban government, by providing a data based systematic study of city councils and council members; and to the methodology of political science, by developing and applying a direct observational approach to political decision-making behavior. Our principal aim is to analyze the impact of older age on decision making in legislative political bodies at the levels of both individual and group behavior. At a time when age discrimination in employment and mandatory retirement are being challenged, life-extending technologies are increasing the number and proportion of elderly in the population. Both legal and demographic trends increase the probability of participation by the elderly in decision-making roles in the public and private sectors over the next few decades. This research explores the political impacts of these trends by analyzing the effects of older age of decision makers and older age structure in organizations upon the decision-making process and on the content and character of public policy decisions. Employing a quasi-experimental design, the study will be conducted in a naturalistic field setting by analyzing decision-making behavior in two samples of city councils: one with older council age structures and one with younger age structures. Data on decision making will be collected primarily through direct observational techniques, including live scoring of the interaction process and coding from tape recorded transcripts of group proceedings. Specific hypotheses, derived from experimental research literature in psychological gerontology and studies in political gerontology will be tested for impact of age or age structure on such variables as speed, accuracy, information utilization, quality of participation, influence, coalition formation, conflict and accomodation, risk taking, flexibility, adaptation to change, issue content, and constituency impact. Data will be developed to compare the groups of younger and older councils and, at a different level, to compare the behavior of younger and older decision makers under different conditions of age structure.
