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The conceptual framework that underlies research on age integration is discussed. Age integration is defined as a random distribution of all age groups in a population because no age barriers exist in any aspect of society.

Research on aging complements existing knowledge on human life and tries to reduce the structural lag in society. This will encourage the elimination of restrictions on education, employment and retirement, and the substitution of age difference by age integration.

The hallmark of sociology is its emphases on first, people, secondly, structures and, thirdly, their interrelationships. Similarly, we see sociological research on age as concerned with (i) people over their life course; (2) age-related structures and institutions; and (3) the dynamic interplay between people and structures as each influences the other. Guided by our 'aging and society paradigm', we review the research legacy as it has focused more on (1) than on (2), and is only now concerned with understanding the interplay between them (3). Hence our challenge to future researchers is to devise strategies for understanding and analysing this interplay and its possible contributions to the ever-accumulating research legacy. KEY WORDS - Changing lives, neglect of structure, interplay between lives and structures, cohort norm formation, aging and society paradigm.