middle-aged

/'midl'eidʤd/

Thân thiện

A middle-aged couple enjoys a walk in the park on a sunny afternoon.

Definition

1. Adjective:
   • Being roughly between 45 and 65 years old: Describing a person who is in the middle period of life, typically after young adulthood and before old age.

Usage

• The term middle-aged is used to describe a person's age group. It is a neutral, descriptive term.
• It is typically used attributively (before a noun) or predicatively (after a linking verb like 'be' or 'seem').
• It can sometimes carry connotations beyond simple age, such as stability, responsibility, or a settled lifestyle, but it is not inherently positive or negative.

Examples

• Attributive use (before a noun):
  • The company is looking to attract more middle-aged customers.
  • He is a middle-aged man with two children.
• Predicative use (after a linking verb):
  • My parents are now considered middle-aged.
  • She doesn't feel middle-aged, even though she's fifty.

Advanced Usage

• "middle-aged spread": A humorous or euphemistic idiom referring to the tendency to gain weight, especially around the waist, during middle age.
  • He started going to the gym to combat the middle-aged spread.
• The concept can be used more broadly or metaphorically to describe something that is no longer new or youthful but not yet old or obsolete.
  • That software platform is entering its middle-aged phase; it's stable but lacks innovative features.

Variants and Related Words

• Middle age (noun): The period of life between youth and old age.
  • He took up painting in middle age.
• Middle-ager (noun, informal): A person who is middle-aged.
  • The event was popular with middle-agers.

Synonyms

• Midlife: Often used in similar contexts, especially in compounds like "midlife crisis."
• In one's prime: Can overlap but often implies peak condition or success, not strictly an age range.

Antonyms

• Young
• Youthful
• Elderly
• Aged

Related Idioms and Phrases

• Midlife crisis: A period of emotional turmoil and drastic change in life, often associated with middle age.
  • After buying the sports car, his friends joked he was having a midlife crisis.

Học thuật

Adjective

1. being roughly between 45 and 65 years old