Self-esteem is relatively stable late in life: The role of resources in the health, self-regulation, and social domains.

Abstract

A large body of research has documented changes in self-esteem across adulthood and individual-difference correlates thereof. However, little is known about whether people maintain their self-esteem until the end of life and what role key risk factors in the health, cognitive, self-regulatory, and social domains play. To examine these questions, we apply growth modeling to 13-year longitudinal data obtained from by now deceased participants of the Berlin Aging Study (BASE, N = 462; age 70 – 103, M = 86.3 yrs., SD = 8.3; 51% male). Results revealed that self-esteem, on average, does decline in very old age and close to death, but the amount of typical decline is minor. Health-related constraints and disabilities as well as lower control beliefs and higher loneliness were each associated with lower self-esteem late in life. We obtained initial evidence that some of these associations were stronger among the oldest-old participants. Our results corroborate and extend initial reports that self-esteem is, on average, fairly stable into the last years of life. We discuss possible pathways by which common and often severe late-life challenges may undermine an otherwise relatively robust self-esteem system.

Retirement is Associated with Change in Self-Esteem

“…With the exception of the well-established association between individual difference in self-esteem and Big Five personality traits at time of retirement (e.g., Wagner et al, 2015), we found no significant effects. Our third finding concerns this apparent lack of evidence for contexts or resources that can explain individual differences in retirees' selfesteem trajectories.…”

“…Past research suggested that late adulthood is characterized by minor declines in self-esteem as well as significant individual differences in individual trajectories (Orth et al, 2010;Wagner, Gerstorf, Hoppmann, & Luszcz, 2013;Wagner et al, 2015). Hence, we predicted that retirement may be associated with decreases in self-esteem.…”

“…Social relationships are a main source of self-esteem (Leary & Baumeister, 2000). Specifically, theory and research have associated feelings of social inclusion and positive social interactions with higher self-esteem throughout the life span, including the retirement years (Wagner et al, 2015). We predicted that a stable social networks and feelings of social integration may buffer potentially negative effects of retirement on self-esteem.…”

Development of self-esteem from age 4 to 94 years: A meta-analysis of longitudinal studies.

“…The decrease from middle adulthood to old age varied much more strongly across studies, with the effect size ranging from about d = −0.20 to −0.70. Overall, this pattern of the life-span trajectory is supported by longitudinal research on mean-level change during specific developmental periods, such as adolescence and young adulthood (Birkeland, Melkevik, Holsen, & Wold, 2012;Chung, Hutteman, van Aken, & Denissen, 2017;Chung et al, 2014;Erol & Orth, 2011;Galambos, Barker, & Krahn, 2006;Harris, Wetzel, Robins, Donnellan, & Trzesniewski, 2018;Kiviruusu, Huurre, Aro, Marttunen, & Haukkala, 2015;Wagner, Lüdtke, Jonkmann, & Trautwein, 2013;Zeiders, Umaña-Taylor, & Derlan, 2013) and old age (von Soest, Wagner, Hansen, & Gerstorf, 2017;Wagner, Gerstorf, et al, 2013;Wagner, Hoppmann, Ram, & Gerstorf, 2015;Wagner, Lang, Neyer, & Wagner, 2014).…”

Self‐esteem Is Mostly Stable Across Young Adulthood: Evidence from Latent STARTS Models

“…This is a time-varying factor of self-esteem that depends in part on the previous time point and a random component. Developmental studies concentrating on panel data have usually focused on this part of self-esteem (Orth et al, 2010;Wagner, Hoppmann, Ram, & Gerstorf, 2015;Wagner, Lang, Neyer, & Wagner, 2014). Finally, the state component, which is free from measurement error in a latent STARTS model, captures only occasion-specific self-esteem characteristics (e.g., measurement-point-specific variability or change in rank-order positioning).…”