Why do we want to be young and beautiful?

From psychological perspective

Within social sciences, the standards of beauty were for a long time considered to be culturally determined, meaning that different people with different life experiences in different cultures acquire different standards of beauty, as captured in the famous sentence "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder". 

However, two groups of findings have challenged this common assumption: 
-First, people in different cultures generally agree on which faces are attractive 
-Second, preferences emerge early in life, before cultural standards of beauty are likely to be assimilated. 

Evolutionary psychology explores the psychological adaptations (evolved psychological mechanisms constructed by natural selection) that constitute human nature. From the perspective of evolutionary psychology, beauty is not a cultural construct and appreciating beauty is not learned but is rather a biological adaptation, a part of universal human nature: the preferences for some physical characteristics reflect adaptations for mate choice because they signal aspects of mate quality. 

Theory of natural selection explains the adaptations, which help organisms in their tasks of survival. However, an organism can be adapted and survive for many years without passing its qualities to future generations--to pass them it must reproduce. The theory of sexual selection explains the adaptations that have arisen as a consequence of successful mating. In order to gain reproductive success, women and men adopt certain mate selection strategies--integrated sets of adaptations, not necessarily conscious, which organize and guide the individual's reproductive efforts. (Acta.C.C, 2010, online)

From general perspective 

- For me, it's the idea that by accepting age, it puts me psychologically at the end of my own one, short life. Trying to stay young allows me the perception that I have more time to live. Of course physically, that doesn't make any sense because we all live to different ages and no one has any control over that...but I feel happier "thinking" that I've got a long way to go.

- You only live one life.

- No one wants to experience what comes with getting old, wrinkle skin,hot flashes, no teeth, expensive dyes,male and female wigs, week bones, loss gravity,bad feet, bad eyes, bad hearing, hearing aids stuck in your ear, not having the strength to do what you once could,can't drive, can't run can't walk, can't read the small print that some are using to decieve older and younger ones , and no one around to care in the times we are living in.    (Yahoo, 2008, online)

The Peter Pan Generation

The Generation Y or the Peter Pan Generation is a large group of 25-40 years old young adults who are mostly the children of the Generation X. The Peter Pan generation got its name after the famous character from the novel of J. M. Barrie due to Peter Pan's mentality that describes this generation perfectly. They Are Never Growing Up!

The members of the Peter Pan Generation are not able or don’t want to face any responsibility such as housing, jobs, marriage and children. Many of them still live with the parents or depend on them financially, since they spin out their studies with years. The people with Peter Pan Syndrome (yes, it exists!) don’t like seeing themselves as adults because they don’t see anything good in being one. They delayed the start of their adulthood. They would like to have a balanced work-life ratio, they tend to spend their time for social networking, friends, hobbies, career is less important. 
(Eva, 2012, online)

Reference

1. Answers.yahoo.com, 2008. Why do people want to stay young?. [online] Available at: http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20100109081720AAtu4Td [Accessed: 5 Dec 2012].

2. Ncbi.nlm.nih.gov, 2010. Why do we all want to be young and beautiful (and women especially)? From the evolutionary psychological perspective.. [online] Available at: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21830463 [Accessed: 5 Dec 2012].

3. Lexiophiles, 2012. Do you want to be forever young? - Welcome to Neverland! [online] Available at: <http://www.lexiophiles.com/english/do-you-want-to-be-forever-young-welcome-to-neverland> [Accessed 5 Dec 2012]

by Shu Man and Nicole Yong