Social organisation of the human life-cycle, and particularly its division into age groups, has undergone profound changes. To the three classic stages in the life-cycle -preparation for occupational life, remunerated activity and family life, and withdrawal from active life (retirement) -are now added periods of transition of increasing duration and whose shape is becoming increasingly difficult to predict: -adolescence, and frequently post-adolescence, from the ages of 15 to 25 or even 30 years; -maturescence (i.e. early to late middle-age), characterised by age-related events in work and family life and by health problems.'The results of a transverse survey carried out in 1985 on a representative sample of the Geneva population aged between 40 and 65 years (405 men and 415 women) have made it possible to approach this period of "early to late middle-age" as a specific phase in the life-cycle, a "cross-roads" in the aging process, at which age-related changes begin to appear.2 One of the first purposes of this transverse survey was to define an historical context for the sample population by stressing in relation to work and the family those features which make this age category unique. A second objective was to examine the impact of occupational and family problems on declining health status.

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RÉSUMÉ L'apparition récente d'une période critique d'âge, située entre 40 et 65 ans, et appelée la « maturescence », est un produit de la vie sociale des sociétés industrielles. Comme carrefour du vieillissement, cette période d'âge n'est pas liée à un âge chronologique précis (cap de la quarantaine ou de la cinquantaine), mais davantage à des difficultés d'âge social associées à des conflits d'identité, à mettre en rapport avec des problèmes spécifiques de santé, de maladie, propres aux effets du vieillissement.