Age differences in deliberate ignorance.
People sometimes choose to remain ignorant, even when information comes at low marginal costs and promises high utility. To investigate whether older adults enlist deliberate ignorance more than younger adults, potentially as an emotion-regulation tool, we presented a representative sample of 1,910 residents of Germany with 13 scenarios in which knowledge could result in substantial gains or losses. The strongest correlate of deliberate ignorance was indeed age. Openness to experience was negatively correlated with deliberate ignorance; risk preference did not and neuroticism did not consistently predict it. Findings sugge...
Source: Psychology and Aging - April 29, 2021 Category: Geriatrics Source Type: research
“Intraindividual variability in neural activity in the prefrontal cortex during active walking in older adults”: Correction to Holtzer et al. (2020).
Reports an error in "Intraindividual variability in neural activity in the prefrontal cortex during active walking in older adults" by Roee Holtzer, Daliah Ross and Meltem Izzetoglu (Psychology and Aging, 2020[Dec], Vol 35[8], 1201-1214). In the article, the following acknowledgment of Dr. Jennifer Yuan was missing from the author note: “The authors would like to acknowledge and thank Dr. Jennifer Yuan for her previous doctoral work that relates to the subject matter of this article.” The online version of this article has been corrected. (The following abstract of the original article appeared in record 2020-85077-001...
Source: Psychology and Aging - April 26, 2021 Category: Geriatrics Source Type: research
Re-examining age differences in the Stroop effect: The importance of the trees in the forest (plot).
Discussion highlights the importance of trial-level data in accounting for group differences in processing speed. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved) (Source: Psychology and Aging)
Source: Psychology and Aging - April 26, 2021 Category: Geriatrics Source Type: research
Disaster stressors and psychological well-being in older adults after a flood.
We examined the inoculation and stress sensitization explanations concerning mental health outcomes in 223 predominately middle-aged and older adults after a flood (M age = 49.6 years, SD = 17.7 years, range: 18–88 years). In multiple linear regression models, having flood damage was associated with higher levels of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and depressive symptoms, while social support was associated with fewer symptoms. Greater lifetime trauma and flood-related stress were associated with more symptoms of depression and PTSD, respectively. Older age was associated with more religious coping and fewer depress...
Source: Psychology and Aging - April 15, 2021 Category: Geriatrics Source Type: research
Subjective age from childhood to advanced old age: A meta-analysis.
The present meta-analysis analyzed how the gap between subjective age and chronological age changes across the life-span and whether the size of this gap varies across regions of the globe. In addition, we tested for sources of the national differences. A systematic search in electronic databases (PsycInfo, Medline, Google Scholar, PSYNDEX) and cross-referencing identified 294 studies (with mean age ranging from 8 to 105 years) that were included in random-effects meta-analyses. While children felt about 3 years or 34% older than their chronological age, older adults (60+ years) felt, on average, between 10.74 and 21.07 ye...
Source: Psychology and Aging - April 8, 2021 Category: Geriatrics Source Type: research
The codevelopment of generativity and well-being into early late life.
The current manuscript replicates and extends the few existing studies of generativity in later adulthood with regard to two aims: (a) to model individual differences in the development of generativity into early late life and (b) to examine the relationship between development in generativity and development in well-being into late midlife and early late life. Data from the Rochester Adult Longitudinal Study (RALS) are used to address these aims in a preregistered secondary analysis of existing RALS data (see https://osf.io/syp2u). Analyses quantify individual development of generativity in a sample of 271 RALS participan...
Source: Psychology and Aging - April 8, 2021 Category: Geriatrics Source Type: research
Are age differences in recognition-based retrieval monitoring an epiphenomenon of age differences in memory?
Older adults often demonstrate a monitoring deficit by producing more high-confidence memory errors on recognition memory tests. To eliminate lower memory performance by older adults (OA) as a candidate explanation, we studied how distinctive encoding enhances the retrieval-monitoring accuracy in older adults and younger adults (YA) under different delays (2-day delay for OA, 7-day delay for YA). Individuals viewed items consisting of four randomly selected exemplars (e.g., SALMON, BASS, PERCH, and SHARK) from a taxonomic category (e.g., FISH), one being designated as the to-be-remembered target. Participants were randomly...
Source: Psychology and Aging - April 1, 2021 Category: Geriatrics Source Type: research
Complexity of work with people: Associations with cognitive functioning and change after retirement.
In conclusion, high complexity of work with people is related to better executive functioning and overall cognition during working life and slower decline after retirement. The finding that more intellectually stimulating work carries cognitive advantage into retirement fits the cognitive reserve concept, where earlier intellectual stimulation brings about lower risks of cognitive problems later. Study results also go along with the unengaged lifestyle hypothesis, whereby people may slip into so-called “mental retirement,” leading to post-retirement cognitive loss, which may be most apparent among those retiring from j...
Source: Psychology and Aging - March 25, 2021 Category: Geriatrics Source Type: research
Exploring the influence of temporal factors on age differences in working memory dual task costs.
Working memory is defined by many as the system that allows us to simultaneously store information over brief time periods while engaging in other information processing activities. In a previous study (Rhodes, Jaroslawska et al. (2019) Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 148, 1204–1227.) we found that retention of serially presented letters was disrupted by the introduction of an arithmetic processing task during a 10 second delay period. Importantly, the magnitude of this dual task disruption increased with age from 18 to 81. The demands of each task were adjusted prior to dual task so that age differences did...
Source: Psychology and Aging - March 18, 2021 Category: Geriatrics Source Type: research
Cross-sectional and prospective association between personality traits and IADL/ADL limitations.
Prior research has shown that personality traits are associated with activities of daily living (ADLs) and instrumental ADLs (IADLs). To advance research on the psychological factors related to aging-related functional limitations, this study examined the relation between personality traits and both concurrent and incident functional limitations, tested whether these associations are similar across IADLs and ADLs, and tested potential mediators of these associations. Participants were drawn from eight longitudinal samples from the U.S., England, and Japan. Participants provided data on demographic variables, the five major...
Source: Psychology and Aging - March 11, 2021 Category: Geriatrics Source Type: research
Should I keep studying? Consequences of a decision to stop learning in young and older adults.
In situations of cognitive overload, the role of a metacognitive decision to stop learning is of utmost importance. We investigated how young and older adults decide to stop learning as a strategy for maximizing memory performance when they face to-be-learned material exceeding their memory capability. People may decide to stop learning for two main reasons: they experience a growing feeling of disfluency as a learning episode progresses and/or they perceive such a decision to be beneficial for future memory performance. In Experiments 1 and 2, participants studied lists of 50 words. The majority of young and older adults ...
Source: Psychology and Aging - March 11, 2021 Category: Geriatrics Source Type: research
Generosity and cooperation across the life span: A lab-in-the-field study.
We present the findings from a novel lab-in-the-field experiment (N = 359, 18–90 years) that examines generosity and cooperation between generations. Our methodological approach allows us to study the effect of age on prosocial behavior as a function of the age of an unknown partner. We ask participants to make several decisions, and to state their expectations for their partners’ behavior, in a dictator game and a prisoner’s dilemma game with real monetary outcomes. The dictator game serves as a measure of generosity, whereas the prisoner’s dilemma serves as a measure of cooperation. We find that individuals used ...
Source: Psychology and Aging - March 11, 2021 Category: Geriatrics Source Type: research
Beyond money: Nonmonetary prosociality across adulthood.
Empirical evidence suggests that self-reported prosociality and donations increase with age. The majority of this research was conducted using monetary donations as outcome measures. However, on average older adults hold a significant advantage in financial and material assets compared to younger adults, effectively lowering the subjective cost of small monetary donations. Are older adults also more prosocial when donating a nonmonetary resource that is of equal or even higher value for them compared to younger age groups? A first study (N = 160, 20–74 years) combined data from self-report measures, affective responses, ...
Source: Psychology and Aging - March 11, 2021 Category: Geriatrics Source Type: research
Daily prosocial activities and well-being: Age moderation in two national studies.
Prosocial activities, such as volunteering, predict better mental and physical health in late adulthood, but their proximal links to well-being in daily life are largely unknown. The current study examined day-to-day associations of prosocial activities with emotional and physical well-being, and whether these associations differ with age. We used daily diary data from the National Study of Daily Experiences (NSDE) II (n = 2,016; ages 33–84) and NSDE Refresher Study (n = 774; ages 25–75). Participants completed telephone interviews on 8 consecutive evenings regarding their prosocial activities (formal volunteering, pro...
Source: Psychology and Aging - March 11, 2021 Category: Geriatrics Source Type: research
Does focusing on others enhance subjective well-being? The role of age, motivation, and relationship closeness.
Prosociality (i.e., voluntary thoughts and actions intended to benefit somebody else) is arguably essential for positive social relationships. The present research investigated under what conditions a prosocial focus has positive effects on the subjective well-being of a prosocial person. We addressed this question in an intervention study of daily social interactions. All participants (N = 295, 57.6% women, age 19–88 years) started the study with a baseline day with no intervention. Participants then underwent a video-based intervention that trained them to focus on either the well-being of others or the well-being of t...
Source: Psychology and Aging - March 11, 2021 Category: Geriatrics Source Type: research
