Feeling Safe and Nostalgia in Healthy Aging

Abstract

The population of older adults worldwide is growing, with an urgent need for approaches that develop and maintain intrinsic capacity consistent with healthy aging. Theory and empirical research converge on feeling safe as central to healthy aging. However, there has been limited attention to resources that cultivate feeling safe to support healthy aging. Nostalgia, “a sentimental longing for one’s past,” is established as a source of comfort in response to social threat, existential threat, and self-threat. Drawing from extant theory and research, we build on these findings to position nostalgia as a regulatory resource that cultivates feeling safe and contributes to intrinsic capacity to support healthy aging. Using a narrative review method, we: (a) characterize feeling safe as a distinct affective dimension, (b) summarize the character of nostalgia in alignment with feeling safe, (c) propose a theoretical account of the mechanisms through which nostalgia cultivates feeling safe, (d) highlight the contribution of nostalgia to feeling safe and emotional, physiological, and behavioral regulatory capabilities in healthy aging, and (e) offer conclusions and direction for research.

Effects of Reminiscence Therapy combined with Memory Specificity Training (RT-MeST) on depressive symptoms in older adults: A Randomized Controlled Trial Protocol

“…Reminiscence therapy has received increasing attention as a psychotherapy that has been developed over a long period of time and has a more mature intervention model. It helps older adults gradually recall memories of past experiences and unresolved con icts through many therapeutic aspects, alleviates negative emotions by integrating all past positive and negative experiences, fosters a sense of security, and helps support the intrinsic capacity of older adults to age healthily (25). Therefore, we implemented a multicenter, single-blind, three-arm parallel group randomized controlled trial to investigate whether the combination of the two therapies can further con rm the role played by autobiographical memory in the overall improvement of depressive symptoms in older adults while promoting the emergence and implementation of more therapies targeting autobiographical memory.…”

“…Reminiscence therapy, as a potential psychological intervention to improve depressive symptoms in older adults, has an important therapeutic aspect of enhancing autobiographical memory, which is often used interchangeably in the literature due to its similarity to the term "life review intervention" (21). It enhances the elderly's positive affect (22), cognitive functioning (23), social participation (24), quality of life, and the ability to adapt to aging (25) through the recall, narration, and re ection of past experiences. In addition to previous meta-analyses showing the signi cant effect of reminiscence-based interventions in improving psychological problems and enhancing well-being in older adults (26-28), there are also empirical studies showing that researchers guided older adults through interventions for reminiscence at different stages of life and that older adults became more resistant to social stress, increased their ability to think and act for themselves, and nally, promote completeness in the nal stages of life (29)(30)(31).…”

Typography Talks: Influencing Vintage Anemoia and Product Safety Perceptions with Vintage Typography

“…Nostalgia, as a psychological response, elicits comforting feelings associated with cozy, familiar, and safe times (Barauskaitė, Gineikienė, and Fennis 2022). Nostalgia not only triggers positive emotions but also activates safety cues, acting as a regulatory resource that enhances feelings of safety (Fleury et al 2022). This calming physiological and emotional response is consistent with feeling safe (Sedikides and Wildschut 2018).…”

“…That is, consumers experiencing vintage anemoia, brought about by the use of vintage typography in marketing materials, will perceive a product as safer. First, vintage anemoia is likely to generate positive emotions (Fleury et al 2022). When consumers experience positive emotions while encountering a product, they are more likely to associate those positive feelings with the product itself (Griskevicius, Shiota, and Nowlis 2010) and, as a result, provide a more favorable safety evaluation.…”

“…Links to the past have been associated with quality and craftmanship, as well as times when things were safer and more understandable (e.g., vintage goods; Barauskaitė, Gineikienė, and Fennis 2022; Sarial-Abi et al 2017; Thompson, Pollio, and Locander 1994). Further, nostalgia serves as a regulatory resource that activates safety cues, providing the same physiological and calming response that makes people feel safe (e.g., Fleury et al 2022; Sedikides and Wildschut 2018). Threats to safety can induce nostalgic responses, as well as provide a protective effect against negative situations (e.g., Brown, Kozinets, and Sherry 2003; Stern 1992).…”