Capturing Subjective Age, Subjective Life Expectancy, and Their Links With Older Adults' Health: The Dutch Longitudinal Aging Study Amsterdam

The middle-aged and older Chinese adults' health using actigraphy in Taiwan (MOCHA-T): protocol for a multidimensional dataset of health and lifestyle

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES

Older adults keep transforming with Baby Boomers and Gen Xers being the leading older population. Their lifestyle, however, is not well understood. The middle-aged and older Chinese adults' health using actigraphy in Taiwan (MOCHA-T) collected both objective and subjective data to depict the health and lifestyle of this population. The objectives, design, and measures of the MOCHA-T study are introduced, and the caveats and future directions related to the use of the data are presented.

METHODS

People aged 50 and over were recruited from the community, with a subset of women aged 45-49 invited to supplement data on menopause and aging. Four instruments (i.e., self-reported questionnaires, diary, wrist actigraphy recorder, and GPS) were used to collect measures of sociodemographic, health, psychosocial, behavioral, temporal, and spatial data.

RESULTS

A total of 242 participants who returned the informed consent and questionnaires were recruited in the MOCHA-T study. Among them, 94.6%, 95.0%, and 25.2% also completed the diary, actigraphy, and GPS data, respectively. There was almost no difference in sociodemographic characteristics between those with and without a completed diary, actigraphy, and GPS data, except for age group and educational level for those who returned completed actigraphy data.

CONCLUSION

The MOCHA-T study is a multidimensional dataset that allows researchers to describe the health, behaviors, and lifestyle patterns, and their interactions with the environment of the newer generation of middle-aged and older adults in Taiwan. It can be compared with other countries with actigraphy and GPS-based lifestyle data of middle-aged and older adults in the future.

Psychological Obsolescence and Subjective Remaining Life Expectancy are Predictors of Generativity in a Six-Year Longitudinal Study

In this research, we explore associations between (changes in) perceived generativity, subjective remaining life expectancy (SRLE), and psychological obsolescence in a longitudinal sample. We hypothesized a higher SRLE and a weaker obsolescence would be concomitants of higher perceived generativity. We also hypothesized that generativity would exhibit intraindividual fluctuation over time, which should relate to intraindividual fluctuation in the respective concomitants. Using multilevel modeling, several concomitants of generativity were investigated. The sample consisted of 518 German participants (aged 18–88 years) who took part in at least two of four measurement waves of the Ageing-as-Future online study spanning over 6 years. There was no mean-level increase or decrease in generativity over the 6-year study period. Despite this absence of linear time trends, individual perceived generativity still fluctuated considerably over time. The model showed that higher individual average SRLE and lower individual average psychological obsolescence resulted in higher average perceived generativity. Individual fluctuations in those constructs coincided likewise, implying that when individual SRLE increased and individual obsolescence decreased between two time points, perceived generativity tended to increase as well. There were significant quadratic, but no linear age effects. The findings suggest that perceived generativity depends not only on chronological age but several other time-related factors. Based on such results, we discuss implications for interventions and future research.

Is Subjective Age Associated with Physical Fitness in Community-Dwelling Older Adults?

Although subjective age has been associated with a range of health-related outcomes, there has been little systematic study on the relationship between the subjective age and physical fitness in a given population. The purpose of this study was to determine the prospective association between subjective age and physical fitness in community-dwelling older adults. A sample of 276 older people who lived in the community was studied. Subjective age was measured by a face-to-face interview. Grip strength, balancing on one leg with eyes open, the 30 s chair stand test, 4 m habitual walk, and 6 min walk test were measured to reflect physical fitness. Results indicated that the felt younger older adults had a higher level of physical fitness compared to their felt older and felt the same counterparts. Multiple linear regression analysis indicated that all the measured physical fitness items were significantly associated with subjective age in older men. All of the measured physical fitness items except for the 4 m habitual walk were remarkably related to subjective age in older women. The findings suggest that subjective age is closely associated with physical fitness in community-dwelling older adults. Much attention should be paid to the promotion of physical fitness to improve the subjective age of older adults.

Subjective Age and Late-Life Functional Status: Mediating and Moderating Effects

OBJECTIVES

The present study examined the longitudinal relationships between subjective age (SA) and future functional status in later life, via depressive symptoms. Additionally, we assessed the role of subjective nearness to death (SNtD) as a potential moderator within these pathways.

METHODS

Older adults (average age 81.14 at T1) were interviewed once a year for three consecutive years (N=224 at T1, N=178 at T2, and N=164 at T3), Participants reported their SA, SNtD, depressive symptoms, and functional status. Additionally, grip strength was employed as an objective measure of functional status.

RESULTS

Data analysis revealed distinct pathways leading from T1 SA to T3 functional status through T2 depressive symptoms. Moreover, T1 SNtD was found to significantly moderate most of these indirect pathways, so that the mediation model of T1 SA-T2 depressive symptoms-T3 functional status was mostly significant among those who felt closer to death.

DISCUSSION

The findings contribute to our understanding of the underlying mechanism through which SA predicts long-term functioning sequelae by underscoring the indirect effect of depressive symptoms. They further indicate the importance of gauging the effects of SNtD on these longitudinal relationships. Present results may further contribute to establishing an integrative model for predicting long-term functional outcomes based on older adults' earlier subjective views of aging.