Midlife Crisis: Definition, Symptoms, & Behavior

We’ve all heard about people having midlife crises, but did you know it’s something psychologists study? Let’s see what the research says about midlife crises.

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When I was about 10 years old, my father appeared one day without a mustache. To me, this was a seismic event: I had never in my entire life seen him without that facial hair, and it changed so much about how he looked. As a child, I was of course wrapped up in how disorienting this change was for me. But as an adult, I wonder what inspired him, in his mid-40s, to alter his appearance in this way. Was his hair starting to gray? Were mustaches going out of style, and I just had no idea? Or was he maybe experiencing a bit of a midlife crisis?

If the day of the mustache shaving (it was never to return, by the way) was an existential moment for my dad, he did not seem to be caught up in self-reflection beyond the cosmetic change. But for many adults—and not just men, by the way, but women as well—there comes a point in midlife when they experience some emotional and personal upheaval around aging. Let’s look at the science of the midlife crisis and see what this moment in a lifetime is really all about.

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What Is a Midlife Crisis? (A Definition)

Broadly speaking, a crisis is a situation of intense and sudden change, and so a midlife crisis means an intense and sudden change in one’s sense of self and understanding of one’s life (Brim et al., 2004). By sense of self and understanding of one’s life, I mean that people experiencing a midlife crisis are questioning things such as their own identity, their close relationships, the groups and roles to which they belong—potentially everything about their lives.

Psychologists have a long history of trying to define and describe the different stages of a human life. It would be reassuring and helpful if each of us passed through a series of identifiable and describable periods in life, right? People who experience a midlife crisis are in the stage called middle adulthood, which is typically characterized by sustained engagement in key roles or experiences such as having a career, being married, and/or raising children (Freund & Ritter, 2009).

The transition from early to middle adulthood seems to occur for most people within a given time range and be clearly marked by milestones such as becoming a parent or buying a house (Levinson, 1978). A midlife crisis seems to consist of an intense and sudden reaction to the reality of one’s middle adulthood lifestyle (Freund & Ritter, 2009). The transition from early to middle adulthood can seem to occur almost seamlessly: There is a lot of momentum in many people’s lives as they go from moving in together to getting married to starting a family. But what comes after this? Potentially, just years of staying the course: working and/or raising children continuously for the next 20 or 30 years. And existing in this state indefinitely, as well as contemplating what it means to live in an aging body, seems to set the stage, for some people, for a midlife crisis.

One study found that nearly every American adult shared a pretty consistent definition of a midlife crisis, but also that their definition was a bit looser than the definitions researchers most commonly use (Wethington, 2000). People in general perceive a midlife crisis as being possible in one’s 30s and 50s as well as in one’s 40s, and, intriguingly, they often relate having a midlife crisis to facing some kind of destabilizing major life event, such as a divorce or a job loss.

How common is the midlife crisis, then? Interestingly, very little scientific research has tried to answer this question, but one of the few studies to try to do so in a systematic way found that about 10% of American men—women were not surveyed in this study—experience a midlife crisis (Brim, 1992).

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Causes of a Midlife Crisis

One early and simple suggestion for what causes midlife crises was that, sometime in middle adulthood, people transition from perceiving their lives in terms of how long they have lived to thinking in terms of how long they have left to live (Neugarten, 1968). This kind of change in outlook does seem to be a part of some of the midlife crises I have heard about. People who suddenly find themselves wondering if they will have enough time to reach all their goals before they die might be expected to be at least a little shaken by such thoughts. After all, moving past one’s midlife point, whatever you consider that to be, means starting to move downhill in terms of one’s physical and mental abilities.

This could be called a major shift in one’s time perspective (Nuttin, 1964). When we perceive the future as expansive and long, we set very different personal goals than we do when we see the future as more limited in length and scope. In fact, perceiving the future that way is pretty upsetting to many people; not only might they have a midlife crisis in response to this shift in time perspective, but they may also start changing their lives to manage the emotions that come with this perspective shift (Freund & Ritter, 2009).

One pair of researchers reviewed decades of early writing about the midlife crisis and concluded that, while many writers wanted to portray a midlife crisis as having a natural biological or psychiatric dimension, it may be more driven by social factors and contextual variables (Kearl & Hoag, 1984). These authors have a great point, given the low percentage of people experiencing a midlife crisis that we discussed earlier: If this was truly a biological phenomenon, it would probably happen to most people, right?

Instead, it seems more likely that we can find good explanations for a midlife crisis in the social pressures people face and the events that rearrange their lives. Maybe it’s an injury that makes it harder to play softball or soccer with peers, or the realization that the nest will be empty soon, or the early death of a parent, that radically shifts how you see yourself in the world.

Examples of Midlife Crises

The midlife crisis cliché might be that of a man who realizes he is aging and gets himself a flashy sports car to regain his sense of youthfulness. The typical midlife crisis involves some kind of precipitating event or internal realization, followed by emotional turmoil and probably some kinds of behavioral change. So imagine, for example, a middle-aged person who has watched their parent succumb to cancer in their early 60s. Thinking about how this parent spent their entire adult life working at the same job or raising children nonstop, the middle-aged person might be overcome with fear that they will face the same fate. Rather than continue along that same path, they quit their longtime job or take an extended vacation to get away from their parenting or professional responsibilities.

Typical Age for a Midlife Crisis

When are people most likely to experience a midlife crisis? Again, we don’t have a ton of solid data on something like this, but in an online survey, 71% of people said they themselves, or somebody they knew, had experienced a midlife crisis, and they reported the average for that crisis to be around 47 years old (Freund & Ritter, 2009). Most people in that study seemed to have their midlife crisis between the ages of 39 and 55.

Midlife Crisis for Women

Even though the stereotype of a midlife crisis at this moment in time might be a man desperately trying to recapture his youth, the idea of a midlife crisis has some origins in feminist thinking about women’s lives (Schmidt, 2018). These early writings noted that traditionally feminine roles of providing childcare and running a household become less pressing for women when their children leave the home, and this change in one’s maternal and domestic identity could potentially be the cause of a midlife crisis. While women can obviously have midlife crises related to other roles, such as their careers, these feminist writers made a very significant point about how parenting responsibilities and gender roles factor into predicting a midlife crisis.

Midlife Crisis for Men

Writing about men’s midlife crises frequently centers around their reflections—or a lack of reflection—on their achievements in life (Tamir, 1989). Noting that men are perhaps less reflective by nature than women on such topics, some authors note that men may engage in serious and painful introspection about whether or not the dreams of their youth have been realized, and they may do so in a more sudden and dramatic way than women might (Levinson, 1978).

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Midlife Crisis Symptoms

Midlife crises seem to be accompanied by symptoms such as feelings of stress and depression, difficulty sleeping or concentrating, memory issues, and even suicidal thoughts and behaviors (Giuntella et al., 2023). In the recent study that observed these patterns, the authors noted that such symptoms are more common at midlife for people in wealthy nations, and they occur at a time when people are in many ways at the peak of their functioning. The authors found this contradiction compelling: Why would people who are in relatively safe and stable countries, with plenty of resources at their disposal, experience all these symptoms? My personal theory is that, in our culture, we often achieve material success at the cost of our relationships, and it is the relative absence of meaningful connections that underlies the crisis.

Stages of a Midlife Crisis

The stages of a midlife crisis, as noted previously, seem to consist first of an upsetting realization or event; second, of a period of emotional and even existential upheaval as one tries to cope with the changes or realization; and third, of a period setting new goals, making behavioral changes, and adjusting expectations (Freund & Ritter, 2009; Oles, 1999). Other research has provided more insight into these stages, noting that in the first stage, people come to see themselves as trapped in their current lifestyle, which is what leads to those feelings of dissatisfaction (Robinson & Smith, 2009). The third stage also consists of experimenting with new choices and activities before settling into and committing to a somewhat changed lifestyle.

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Behaviors During a Midlife Crisis

Behaviors in a midlife crisis include all the psychiatric symptoms noted before, such as feeling hopeless or depressed, difficulty sleeping and concentrating, and thinking about taking one’s own life (Giuntella et al., 2023). What kinds of behaviors might people engage in during the experimentation stage of their midlife crisis? They might leave their jobs, their spouses, or even their families, end old friendships or start to pursue new ones, or become obsessed with an activity they have never engaged in or used to enjoy many years ago.

Psychology of a Midlife Crisis

Psychologists have seen the midlife crisis as a reaction to approaching death (Jaques, 1965), a tug-of-war between stagnating and remaining productive and connected (Erikson, 1963), and a reaction to a sense of already having stagnated (Levinson, 1978). Multiple of these psychologists saw hitting a specific age, such as a round number like 40, as carrying powerful symbolic value that could result in a sense of crisis. They reason that we attach a lot of meaning to reaching certain ages, and at such ages we can become discouraged by how much we have or have not achieved.

Midlife Crisis and Mental Breakdowns

For a very few people, a midlife crisis can look like a complete mental breakdown (Giuntella et al., 2023). For the rest, although psychiatric symptoms may occur, they do not reach the level of a complete mental breakdown. Oh, and by the way, a midlife crisis is not a psychiatric diagnosis like depression or schizophrenia.

How to Cope With a Midlife Crisis

There are no established treatments for a midlife crisis. Some people figure out solutions on their own, while others might consult a religious leader, close friends, or a therapist. That said, it is clear that many men lack close connections and feel unsupported in their families, and building a greater sense of support may protect them against developing a midlife crisis (Kwon & Oh, 2021). It has also been suggested that people who experience true midlife crises already had some risk of mental health problems in the first place (Lachman & Bertrand, 2001), and therefore those people are likely to benefit from traditional psychotherapy. If you’d like to learn more about how to deal with a midlife crisis, I recommend watching the video below:

Video: Navigating a Mid-Life Crisis

Articles Related to Midlife Crisis

Want to learn more? Check out these articles:

Books Related to Midlife Crisis

If you’d like to keep learning more, here are a few books that you might be interested in.

Final Thoughts on Midlife Crisis

Most people will not experience a midlife crisis, but for those that do, both professional and personal support are available. Ultimately, a midlife crisis may help a person come to live a life more aligned with their values, once the crisis itself has passed.

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References

Brim, O. G. (1992). Ambition: How we manage success and failure throughout our lives. Basic Books.
Brim, O. G., Ryff, C. D., & Kessler, R. C. (Eds.). (2004). How healthy are we?: A national study of well-being at midlife. University of Chicago Press.
Erikson, E. H. (1963). Childhood and society. Norton.
Freund, A. M., & Ritter, J. O. (2009). Midlife crisis: A debate. Gerontology, 55(5), 582–591.
Giuntella, O., McManus, S., Mujcic, R., Oswald, A. J., Powdthavee, N., & Tohamy, A. (2023). The midlife crisis. Economica, 90(357), 65–110.
Jaques, E. (1965). Death and the midlife crisis. International Journal of Psychoanalysis, 46(4), 502–514.
Kearl, M. C., & Hoag, L. J. (1984). The social construction of the midlife crisis: A case study in the temporalities of identity. Sociological Inquiry, 54(3), 279–300.
Kwon, M., & Oh, J. (2021). Mediating effects of family stress on the relationship between self-efficacy and midlife crisis in middle-aged men. Sustainability, 13(7), 3761.
Lachman, M. E., & Bertrand, R. M. (2001). Personality and the self in midlife. In M. E. Lachman (Ed.), Handbook of midlife development (pp. 279–309). John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
Levinson, D. J. (1978). The seasons of a man's life. Ballantine Books.
Neugarten, B. L. (Ed.). (1968). Middle age and aging (Vol. 10). University of Chicago Press.
Nuttin, J. R. (1964). The future time perspective in human motivation and learning. Acta Psychologica, 23, 60–82.
Oles, P. K. (1999). Towards a psychological model of midlife crisis. Psychological Reports, 84(3_suppl), 1059–1069.
Robinson, O. C., & Smith, J. A. (2009). Metaphors and metamorphoses: Narratives of identity during times of crisis. In Narrative, memory and identities (pp. 85–94). University of Huddersfield Press.
Schmidt, S. (2018). The feminist origins of the midlife crisis. The Historical Journal, 61(2), 503–523.
Tamir, L. M. (1989). Modern myths about men at midlife: An assessment. In S. Hunter & M. Sundel (Eds.), Midlife Myths: Issues, Findings, and Practice Implications. (pp. 157–179). Sage Publications.
Wethington, E. (2000). Expecting stress: Americans and the “midlife crisis”. Motivation and Emotion, 24, 85–103.

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