A comparison of 49-51 year old women with 52-55 year old women shows that the older women experience their lives and relations more positively. It seems that they have recently gone through a change in relation to their children, partner, work, and friends. They are less worried about their health and less afraid of illness. They accept death more rapidly. The results indicate that the women who are a couple of years over 50 have worked through an emotional crisis catalyzed by their 50th birthdays. The emotional crisis is discussed within the framework of female stereotypes. A woman who realizes that she is no longer young is also confronted by the realization that she no longer fits the positive female stereotypes which belong to a young woman in Western culture. This might be an impetus for personal change.
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Niemelä et al. (1993) studied this question.