The Combined Effects of Daily Stressors and Major Life Events on Daily Subjective Ages

Jennifer A. Bellingtier, Shevaun D. Neupert and Dana Kotter-Grühn

The Journals of Gerontology: Series B, 2017, vol. 72, issue 4, 613-621

Abstract: Objectives:Stressors may be a contributing factor in determining how old an individual feels, looks, or would like to be. Currently, little research has been devoted to understanding the relationship between stressors and subjective age in older adults. We focus on the combined impact of major life-event stressors and daily stressors on multiple indicators of subjective age: felt age, ideal age, and look age. Furthermore, we examine the process by which daily stressors relate to subjective ages by testing whether positive affect, control, and negative affect mediate this relationship.Method:Using a daily-diary design, the current study measured older adults’ (60–96 years old) stressors, subjective ages, personal control, and affect.Results:Felt, ideal, and look ages each demonstrated a unique pattern of interactions between daily stressors and major life-event stressors. Furthermore, our findings suggest that on the daily level, the relationship between stressors and felt age is mediated by negative affect but not by control and positive affect.Discussion:Findings indicate the need to consider the broader contextual picture of stressors, as well as their differential impact on multiple indicators of subjective age.

Keywords: Affect; Control; Daily stressors; Stressful life events; Subjective age. (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2017
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1093/geronb/gbv101 (application/pdf)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:oup:geronb:v:72:y:2017:i:4:p:613-621.

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://academic.oup.com/journals

Access Statistics for this article

The Journals of Gerontology: Series B is currently edited by Psychological Sciences - S. Duke Han, PhD and Social Sciences - Jessica A Kelley, PhD, FGSA

More articles in The Journals of Gerontology: Series B from The Gerontological Society of America Oxford University Press, Great Clarendon Street, Oxford OX2 6DP, UK.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Oxford University Press ().