Department of Psychology, Humboldt University of Berlin, Berlin, Germany.
J Pers Soc Psychol. 2013 Jul;105(1):139-53. doi: 10.1037/a0032279. Epub 2013 Apr 29.
Is it possible to maintain a positive perspective on the self into very old age? Empirical research so far is rather inconclusive, with some studies reporting substantial declines in self-esteem late in life, whereas others report relative stability into old age. In this article, we examine long-term change trajectories in self-esteem in old age and very old age and link them to key correlates in the health, cognitive, self-regulatory, and social domains. To do so, we estimated growth curve models over chronological age and time-to-death using 18-year longitudinal data from the Australian Longitudinal Study of Ageing (N = 1,215; age 65-103 years at first occasion; M = 78.8 years, SD = 5.9; women: 45% of sample). Results revealed that self-esteem was, on average, fairly stable with minor declines only emerging in advanced ages and at the very end of life. Examination of the vast between-person differences revealed that lower cognitive abilities and lower perceived control independently related to lower self-esteem. Also, lower cognitive abilities were associated with steeper age-related and mortality-related self-esteem decrements. In our discussion, we consider a variety of challenges that potentially shape self-esteem late in life and highlight the need for more mechanism-oriented research to better understand the pathways underlying stability and change in self-esteem.
是否有可能在非常高龄时保持对自我的积极看法？目前的实证研究结果相当不一致，一些研究报告称，自尊心在晚年大幅下降，而另一些研究则报告称，自尊心在老年时相对稳定。在本文中，我们研究了老年人和非常老年人自尊心的长期变化轨迹，并将其与健康、认知、自我调节和社会领域的关键相关因素联系起来。为此，我们使用澳大利亚老龄化纵向研究（N = 1,215；第一次出现时年龄为 65-103 岁；M = 78.8 岁，SD = 5.9；女性：样本的 45%）18 年的纵向数据，通过时间顺序年龄和死亡时间估计增长曲线模型。结果表明，自尊心平均相当稳定，只有在高龄和生命末期才出现轻微下降。对个体间巨大差异的考察表明，较低的认知能力和较低的感知控制独立地与较低的自尊心有关。此外，较低的认知能力与年龄相关和与死亡相关的自尊心下降更为陡峭相关。在讨论中，我们考虑了可能影响晚年自尊心的各种挑战，并强调需要更多以机制为导向的研究，以更好地理解自尊心稳定性和变化的潜在途径。
