Context influences on the relationship between views of aging and subjective age: The moderating role of culture and domain of functioning.

Abstract

Subjective age has been shown to reliably predict a variety of psychological and physical health outcomes, yet our understanding of its determinants is still quite limited. Using data from the Aging as Future project, the authors examined the degree to which views of aging influence subjective age and how this influence varies across cultures and domains of everyday functioning. Using data from 1,877 adults aged from 30 to 95 years of age collected in China, Germany, and the United States, they assessed how general attitudes about aging and perceptions of oneself as an older adult influenced subjective age estimates in 8 different domains of functioning. More positive attitudes about aging were associated with older subjective ages, whereas more positive views of self in old age were associated with younger subjective age. It is hypothesized that these effects are reflective of social-comparison processes and self-protective mechanisms. These influences varied considerably over contexts, with views of aging having a greater impact in domains associated with stronger negative stereotypes of aging (e.g., health) compared to those with more positive ones (e.g., family). Culture also moderated the impact of aging views in terms of the strength of prediction, direction of effect, and age of greatest influence, presumably due to cultural differences in the salience and strength of aging-related belief systems across contexts. The results illustrate the contextual sensitivity of subjective age and highlight the role played by an individual's views of old age-both in general and regarding oneself-in determining their own experience of aging. (PsycINFO Database Record

Age-Stereotype Internalization and Dissociation: Contradictory Processes or Two Sides of the Same Coin?

“…Recently, effects on age-group dissociation were replicated and extended in longitudinal and cross-cultural samples. Consistent with previous findings, results showed that negative age-stereotypical perceptions elicit younger subjective age (participants report feeling younger) and greater distancing of oneself from the group of older people, especially in strongly stereotyped domains (e.g., work, health; Hess et al, 2017; Kornadt, Hess, Voss, & Rothermund, 2016).…”

Subjective Age in Older Korean Americans: The Impact of Functional Disability Mediated by Attitudes Toward Aging

“…While the former reflects socially grounded personal beliefs about growing older and aged people, the latter relates to self-concept as it represents an overall satisfaction with individuals’ self-views along with age-related changes (e.g., Levy, Slade, & Kasl, 2002). Consistent with this idea, more recent works documented that attitudes toward one’s own aging are likely to operate in an opposite way to that of aging attitudes in general, with more negative attitudes resulting in an older subjective age (Hess et al., 2017; Kornadt, Hess, Voss, & Rothermund, 2016).…”

“…Attitudes toward aging refers to one’s general evaluations about the personal experience of growing older (for a review, see Diehl et al., 2014). Prior research has shown the negative impact of functional disability on attitudes toward aging (e.g., Harrison, Blozis, & Stuifbergen, 2008; Sargent-Cox, Anstey, & Luszcz, 2012) and the close connection between attitudes toward aging and subjective age (e.g., Bodner, Ayalon, Avidor, & Palgi, 2017; Hess et al., 2017); however, the intervening role of attitudes toward aging in the relationship between functional disability and subjective age has not yet been clearly established.…”

Actualization of Potential Life Experience in Normal Aging

“…Some researchers notice that when a person accumulates and enriches life experience it allows him/her to be not only an object of life, but also its subject [3], [22], [23]. It is important that human experience is characterized by elasticity and reversibility at the expense of constant revision of cognitive and emotional assessment, re-interpretation of results of some events or life stages and, consequently, the change of its structure is observed [24].…”