Emotional experience improves with age: evidence based on over 10 years of experience sampling.
Recent evidence suggests that emotional well-being improves from early adulthood to old age. This study used experience-sampling to examine the developmental course of emotional experience in a representative sample of adults spanning early to very late adulthood. Participants (N = 184, Wave 1; N = 191, Wave 2; N = 178, Wave 3) reported their emotional states at five randomly selected times each day for a one week period. Using a measurement burst design, the one-week sampling procedure was repeated five and then ten years later. Cross-sectional and growth curve analyses indicate that aging is associated with more positive overall emotional well-being, with greater emotional stability and with more complexity (as evidenced by greater co-occurrence of positive and negative emotions). These findings remained robust after accounting for other variables that may be related to emotional experience (personality, verbal fluency, physical health, and demographic variables). Finally, emotional experience predicted mortality; controlling for age, sex, and ethnicity, individuals who experienced relatively more positive than negative emotions in everyday life were more likely to have survived over a 13 year period. Findings are discussed in the theoretical context of socioemotional selectivity theory.
Department of Psychology, Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305-2130, USA. laura.carstensen@stanford.edu
Laura L
LL
Carstensen
Bulent
B
Turan
Susanne
S
Scheibe
Nilam
N
Ram
Hal
H
Ersner-Hershfield
Gregory R
GR
Samanez-Larkin
Kathryn P
KP
Brooks
John R
JR
Nesselroade
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D000375:Aging / Q000523:psychology*; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D004644:Emotions; D005260:Female; D006240:Happiness; D006801:Humans; D007407:Interviews as Topic; D008137:Longitudinal Studies; D008297:Male; D008603:Mental Health; D008875:Middle Aged; D010551:Personality; D011581:Psychological Tests; D012959:Socioeconomic Factors; D055815:Young Adult