Perhaps the most important single finding in the field of emotional aging has been that the overall quality of affective experience steadily improves during adulthood and can be maintained into old age. Recent lifespan developmental theories have provided motivation- and experience-based explanations for this phenomenon. These theories suggest that, as individuals grow older, they become increasingly motivated and able to regulate their emotions, which could result in reduced negativity and enhanced positivity. The objective of this paper is to expand existing theories and empirical research on emotional aging by presenting a discrete emotions perspective. To illustrate the usefulness of this approach, we focus on a discussion of the literature examining age differences in anger and sadness. These two negative emotions have typically been subsumed under the singular concept of negative affect. From a discrete emotions perspective, however, they are highly distinct and show multidirectional age differences. We propose that such contrasting age differences in specific negative emotions have important implications for our understanding of long-term patterns of affective well-being across the adult lifespan.

The adaptive role of cautious behavior in advanced age and accommodation is discussed within a developmental regulation framework.

Purpose The protective role of accommodative coping in mitigating possible aversive consequences of criminal victimization and fear of crime was investigated across different types of criminal offences and age groups. Methods Two hundred and forty‐six participants aged 15–77 years participated in a cross‐sectional, Internet‐based questionnaire study. They provided information on their experiences of criminal victimization, depressive symptoms, fear of crime (FC), and accommodative coping. Results Multiple regression analyses showed that accommodative coping had a moderating (buffering) effect, both on the positive relationship between criminal victimization and fear of crime and on the positive relationship between fear of crime and victims’ depressive symptoms. The greater the tendency of accommodative coping was, the weaker were the relationships between criminal victimization and fear of crime, and between fear of crime and depressive symptoms. Conclusions The results indicate that accommodative processes could indeed facilitate adaptive coping with criminal victimization and could, at least for some of the assumed negative psychological consequences, have a protective effect.

This study investigated age differences in anger and sadness in a sample of 82 younger (Mage = 26, SDage = 4.05) and 80 older (Mage = 70, SDage = 3.95) adults. Participants were instructed to first relive a personal memory that was characterized by either anger or sadness and to subsequently think aloud about this memory. Across different emotional response systems (i.e., subjective feelings, verbal expressions, facial behaviors, physiological arousal), older adults reacted with less anger than did their younger counterparts, whereas age differences in sadness were less pronounced. Together the findings corroborate the idea that age differences in negative emotional reactivity are multidirectional and suggest that a discrete emotions approach may complement dimensional approaches to emotional aging. (PsycINFO Database Record

Whereas it is well established that having a sense of control over one's life circumstances facilitates positive aging-related outcomes across adulthood and old age, far less is known about what factors contribute to perceived control and whether these factors differ across the adult life span. We used longitudinal data from the Health and Retirement Study (N = 7,624, M age at 2006 = 67.50 years, range 50-104, 59% women) to examine whether level of, and time-related change in, episodic memory, depressive symptoms, and health (functional limitations, self-rated health) predict levels of 2 distinct components of perceived control: constraints and mastery. We found that lower levels of memory, more depressive symptoms, and less positive self-rated health were each associated with higher levels of constraints. Increases in depressive symptoms and functional limitations were also associated with higher levels of constraints, whereas stability in memory was related to lower levels of constraints. Conversely, lower levels of, and declines in, depressive symptoms and functional limitations as well as higher self-rated health were associated with self-reported higher levels of mastery. We found some evidence to suggest that these effects differ across the adult life span. Our findings show that, across adulthood and old age, constraints and mastery are shaped by level of, and time-related changes in, key domains of functioning. These findings provide impetus for future research to target mechanisms and moderators of such associations. (PsycINFO Database Record