Kotter-Grühn Dana, Kleinspehn-Ammerlahn Anna, Gerstorf Denis, Smith Jacqui
Center for Lifespan Psychology, Max Planck Institute for Human Development, Berlin, Germany.
Psychol Aging. 2009 Sep;24(3):654-67. doi: 10.1037/a0016510.
Satisfaction with one's own aging and feeling young are indicators of positive well-being in late life. Using 16-year longitudinal data from participants of the Berlin Aging Study (P. B. Baltes & K. U. Mayer, 1999; N = 439; 70- to 100-year-olds), the authors examined whether and how these self-perceptions of aging change with age and how such changes relate to distance from death. Extending previous studies, they found that it is not only higher aging satisfaction and younger subjective age but also more favorable change patterns (e.g., less decline in aging satisfaction) that are uniquely associated with lower mortality hazards. These effects are robust after controls for objective measures such as age, gender, socioeconomic status, diagnosis of dementia, or number of illnesses. As individuals approach death, they become less satisfied with their aging and report feeling older. For aging satisfaction, mortality-related decline is much steeper than age-related decline, whereas change in subjective age is best characterized as an age-related process. The authors discuss how self-perceptions of aging are embedded in mechanisms underlying pathways of dying late in life.
对自身衰老的满意度以及感觉年轻是晚年积极幸福感的指标。作者利用来自柏林衰老研究参与者的16年纵向数据（P.B. 鲍尔特斯和K.U. 迈尔，1999年；N = 439；70至100岁），研究了这些衰老的自我认知是否以及如何随年龄变化，以及这些变化与离死亡的距离有何关系。在扩展先前研究的基础上，他们发现不仅更高的衰老满意度和更年轻的主观年龄，而且更有利的变化模式（例如，衰老满意度下降更少）与更低的死亡风险独特相关。在控制了年龄、性别、社会经济地位、痴呆诊断或疾病数量等客观指标后，这些影响依然稳健。随着个体接近死亡，他们对自身衰老的满意度降低，并报告感觉更老。对于衰老满意度，与死亡相关的下降比与年龄相关的下降要陡峭得多，而主观年龄的变化最能被描述为一个与年龄相关的过程。作者讨论了衰老的自我认知是如何嵌入到晚年死亡途径的潜在机制中的。
