How Do Marital Transitions Affect Self-Perceptions of Aging?

Abstract

Objectives We analyzed whether marital status and experiences of marital loss or gain were associated with self-perceptions of aging (SPA), a major psychosocial mechanism of healthy aging. Method We used data from 7028 participants of the Health and Retirement Study. Participants reported their marital status and their positive and negative SPA on two occasions 4 years apart. We ran general linear models to analyze differences in SPA between men and women who remained married, became divorced or widowed, or remarried following divorce or widowhood. Results Participants who experienced marital loss had lower positive SPA than participants who remained marred. Participants who experienced marital gain had lower negative SPA than participants who remained married. None of the associations differed between men and women. Discussion Results suggest that it may not be marital status itself, but rather the transition into or out of marriage, that impacts how people appraise their own aging.

Do partnership transitions affect individual perceptions of aging in later life? Findings from the German Ageing Survey and the NRW80+ study

“…A very recent study from the US revealed that not marital status is associated with PA but marital transitions (Turner et al, 2023). Among adults aged 50 and older, spousal loss is associated with less positive PA, while repartnering is related to less negative perceptions compared to remaining married.…”

“…Research has shown that retirement has a major effect on PA (Bordone et al, 2020;Schafer & Shippee, 2010;Zihan & Post, 2020). Moreover, it can be assumed that the timing of widowhood or repartnering can be crucial for PA, since it is chrononormatively different if individuals are, for example, widowed at age 50 or at age 70 (Turner et al, 2023). Reducing the sample to retirees contributed to ensure that the respondents were in a comparable age-specific phase.…”

“…To control for confounding effects, we added covariates that previous studies have identified to be associated with PA (cf. Barrett, 2005;Barret & Gumber, 2020;Bordone et al, 2020;Kaufman & Elder, 2003;Logan et al, 1992;Shmerlina, 2015;Turner et al, 2023). The age at the time of the interview was recorded directly in DEAS and was taken from the registration office data in NRW80+.…”

“…While the findings from other countries on the association of partnerships and PA have been contradictory (Barrett, 2005;Bergland et al, 2013;Bordone et al, 2020;Logan et al, 1992;Schafer & Shippee, 2010;Turner et al, 2023;Zihan & Post, 2020), there has been little explicit discussion about this issue in the German context (cf. Jung et al, 2021;Kaspar et al, 2022;Rupprecht et al, 2022).…”

“…Like other recent studies (cf. Kaspar et al, 2022;Jung et al, 2021;Turner et al, 2023), we seek to overcome the drawbacks of previous research and contribute to the current literature in the following ways. First, we use longitudinal panel data and apply hybrid regression models to examine different marital and non-marital partnership characteristics.…”