International Journal of Aging & Human Development最新文献

Using data from the Canadian Longitudinal Study on Aging, in this study we provide an alternative explanation for the gap of life satisfaction between living-alone immigrants and Canadian-born older adults. Based on the Big-Five personality traits, we use the latent class analysis to generate two types of social dispositions, social independence and social dependence. With social dispositions taken into account, living alone contributes to life satisfaction in opposite ways for immigrant and Canadian-born older adults, by playing a negative role for the former group and a positive role for the latter. The trend of higher life satisfaction among the living-alone Canadian-born are mainly among the socially independent, whereas for immigrants, socially dependent older adults experience the lowest level of life satisfaction when living alone. Therefore, while socially independent Canadian-born older adults gain a "living-alone premium" in life satisfaction; their socially dependent immigrant counterparts experience a "living-alone penalty" in life satisfaction.

The positivity effect and the positivity bias were examined in voluntary and involuntary autobiographical memories in a sample of younger (n = 69, M_age= 23.2) and older adults (n = 57, M_age= 67.72). The positivity effect has been shown to be sensitive to instructional constraints and cognitive resources. Instructions were manipulated in the voluntary autobiographical memory condition such that participants were instructed to retrieve memories with different levels of constraints. Participants also completed two measures of cognitive control and an assessment of future time perspective. There was no evidence of the positivity effect or positivity bias once depressive symptoms were included as a covariate in the analyses, nor did cognitive control influence memory valence. Future time perspective did not mediate the relationship between age and memory valence. These results suggest that additional research should focus on potential variables that may influence the positivity effect and bias within autobiographical memories.

Migrant workers' retirement in rural China need not mean that they are financially ready for retirement. This study examines which factors influence migrant workers' public pension savings. Using a mixed-methods approach comprising surveys and interviews with Chinese migrant workers from three emigration provinces (Anhui, Henan, and Sichuan), we find that migrant workers with more social support and less spending on children are more likely to have public pension savings than their counterparts. We also observe an age cohort effect for spending on children: The younger cohorts of migrant workers in their 40s and 50s are more likely to spend their savings on children than save for retirement. In the dual process of urbanization and population aging, the emergence of retirement in rural China is reshaping the intergenerational relations such that the culture of filial piety is no longer the sole foundation of old-age financial security.

Engagement in healthier lifestyle behaviors often is motivated by a focus on the future. However, there is limited research on the associations between health behavior and future time perspective, defined as people's tendency to perceive their future as expansive or as limited. Data came from a survey of U.S. adults (N = 805, 49.3% female; M = 50 years, range: 19 to 85 years). Participants completed measures of perceptions of future opportunities and time and health behavior. Opportunities and time factors were uniquely associated with health behavior. While the perceived opportunities factor was strongly associated with better health behavior, the time factor was associated with poorer health behavior. However, this latter association was dependent on individual demographic and health status differences. These findings suggest that perceptions of future opportunities can play an important role in health behavior engagement and thus represent an important target for health promotion.

This study examined the effect of nostalgia proneness on the level of achievement of developmental tasks during the later stages of adulthood (generativity and ego integrity) and the indirect effect of nostalgia on ego integrity. The level of nostalgia proneness changes with age and contributes to subjective well-being in old age. We assumed that nostalgia proneness affects generativity and ego integrity. To confirm the causal relationship between nostalgia proneness and achievement of developmental tasks, a longitudinal study was conducted. We conducted an Internet survey twice with 600 Japanese adults (aged 20-87). The first and second surveys (T1 and T2) were conducted in March 2021 and March 2022, respectively. The questionnaire comprised the Inventory of Psychosocial Balance scale, positive/negative nostalgia proneness scale, and state functions of the nostalgia scale. An autoregressive path model indicated that high and low levels of positive and negative proneness, respectively, predicted ego integrity. The results of the mediation analysis suggested that social connections have an indirect effect on ego integrity and that people who tend to feel positive emotions are less likely to feel negative emotions when they remember nostalgic memories, which leads to a sense of social connection and the acquisition of ego integrity. The findings provide an understanding of the processes through which developmental tasks are facilitated in later adulthood and elucidate the efficacy of psychosocial interventions in older adults.

Suicidal behavior in older adults is a fundamental public health problem globally and the highest suicide rates occur in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). However, there is limited research on suicidality among older adults, especially in sub-Saharan Africa. We sought to find out whether loneliness, stress and religiosity would be associated with suicide ideation in a sample of sub-Saharan African older adults (N = 500; aged 51-70 years, M_age= 58.97, SD = 6.16; 45.6% women). They completed the Beck Suicidal Ideation Scale, the UCLA Loneliness Scale-version 3, Perceived Stress Scale, and Religiosity Scale. Regression results showed that whereas suicidal ideation could be increased by loneliness and stress, religious older adults were less likely to report suicidal ideation. Interventions aimed at managing and protecting the mental health of older adults during their transition to late adulthood should guard them against loneliness and buffer their resilience and coping strategies with the connectedness that religiosity offers.

Caregivers of older adults with dementia (dementia caregivers) often experience high role overload (i.e., feeling overwhelmed by caregiving demands that exceed available resources), which can take a toll on their mental health. Moreover, dementia caregiving can restrict caregivers' participation in valued social activities. This study aims to examine the mediating effect of social participation restriction on the relationship between role overload and mental health among dementia caregivers. A total of 894 dementia caregivers (mean age = 61.77) were selected from the National Study of Caregiving. The sample was predominantly women (64%) and White (78%). Path analysis shows that social participation restriction partially mediated the associations between (1) role overload and psychological distress (indirect effect β = .08, p < .001) and (2) role overload and psychological wellbeing (indirect effect β = -.05, p < .05). Interventions targeting coping strategies and healthcare-recreation programs are needed to improve social participation among dementia caregivers.

This study examined the mediating effect of social adaptation on the associations between sources of social support and depressive symptoms among Chinese older adults, and explored how filial piety moderated these associations in different ways. Data were drawn from the China Longitudinal Aging Social Survey in 2018 (N = 6617). Regression analysis and bootstrap test were used to assess the mechanisms underlying the inconsistency between different sources of social support and depressive symptoms. We found that social support, except for pension, significantly affected depressive symptoms through social adaptation. Moreover, filial piety positively moderated the mediating effect of social adaptation on the association between social support inside the family and depressive symptoms, while negatively moderating it in regard to social support outside the family, except for pension, and depressive symptoms. The results showed filial piety may affect the extent to which older adults convert different sources of social support into personal subjective welfare.

This study examined how different sources of social support from family members (excluding partners), friends, and partners were associated with moderate and vigorous leisure-time physical activity (LTPA) among middle-aged and older adults. This study included married participants aged 45 or older (N = 2,155) from the Midlife in the United States secondary data set. Hierarchical linear regression was performed to investigate the relationship between the three sources of social support and moderate LTPA, and separately, with vigorous LTPA. Partner support (b = 0.19, p < .01), family support (b = -0.19, p < .01), and friend support (b = 0.26, p < .001) were all significantly associated with moderate LTPA. Only social support from friends was associated with vigorous LTPA (b = 0.24, p < .001). Our study emphasizes the significance of social support in influencing LTPA behaviors among middle-aged and older adults. Future programs promoting physical activity should incorporate social support from friends to have the greatest impact.

We examined age differences in the within-person relationships among perceived stress (PS), perceived stress reactivity (PSR), and depressive affect (DA) as well as potential mechanisms of depression with a longitudinal moderated mediation model. Participants from the Notre Dame Study of Health & Wellbeing (N = 572) completed two to four waves of yearly assessments. Sequentially built multilevel models, in which year was nested within person, illustrated that only midlife adults experience an exacerbated effect of within-person fluctuations in PSR on the relationship between within-person PS and DA levels (γ₄₁= -.004, p < .01). Findings further suggest that PSR accounts for the PS-DA relationship. Furthermore, older adults illustrate successful emotion regulation strategies at the yearly level-resisting the negative ramifications of years of greater PS and PSR, whereas midlife adults who experience years of greater PSR would particularly benefit from stress management interventions and monitoring of DA levels.