Possible selves in adulthood and old age: A tale of shifting horizons.

Abstract

Young, middle-aged, and elderly adults (N= 308) evaluated themselves on 6 dimensions of psychological well-being according to present, past, future, and ideal self-assessments, "\bung and middleaged adults saw considerable improvement in themselves from the past to the present on all dimensions of well-being. The elderly, however, indicated largely a perception of stability with prior levels of functioning. Future ratings showed that the 2 younger groups expected continued gains in the years ahead, whereas the oldest respondents foresaw decline on most aspects of well-being. The comparison of present and ideal self-ratings supported (cross-sectionally) the hypothesis that with age, individuals achieve a closer fit between their ideal and their actual self-perceptions.The purpose of this study was to examine how adults and the elderly conceive of their personal progress or decline over the course of adult life. The assumption was that perceptions of improvement, maintenance, and decline constitute aspects of psychological well-being that are typically overlooked. Most studies of subjective well-being focus on present self-evaluathe contrast with past and future evaluations provides critical information about whether individuals see themselves getting better or worse over time. Positive mental health thus includes not only the sense that one is functioning well in the present but also the sense that one has held steady or improved relative to the past and that similar well-being is anticipated in the future.Such temporal self-evaluations parallel current social psychological interest in possible selves (Markus & Nurius, 1986;Markus & Ruvolo, 1989), defined as representations of the self in the past and future. These self-representations may function as incentives for future behavior (selves to be approached or avoided), and they also provide an evaluative, interpretive context for current views of the self. The latter component, namely how past and future selves contribute to interpretations of personal progress or decline over time, was the focus in this study Such questions relate to conceptions of self-narratives (Gergen & Gergen, 1988), described as the individual's attempt to understand his or her cross-time trajectory. Such narratives can be stable (the individual's evaluative images remain unchanged over time), progressive (evaluative images show increments over time), or regressive (evaluative images show decrements over time). My aim was to examine possible age differences in these patterns of self-narratives.

“Still the same and better off than others?”: social and temporal comparisons in old age

“…a lateral comparison) should therefore be the most preferred form of temporal comparison. Supporting evidence for this notion is reported by Ryff (1991); the author compared elderly, middle-aged, and young adults concerning their present and past perceptions of different dimensions of subjective well-being. She reported that the difference between present and past was quite low indicating a similarity or maintenance of prior levels in the group of the elderly whereas the younger groups perceived improvement on all dimensions.…”

Looking back and looking ahead: Adult age differences in consistency of diachronous ratings of subjective well-being.

“…1 Second, there are fewer studies that combine all three types of diachronous rating, that is, past, present, and future evaluations (for exception, see, e.g., Ross & Buehler, 2001;Ryff, 1991). Mostly, there is emphasis on comparing either past or future evaluations with present self-evaluations (e.g., Conway & Ross, 1984;Cross & Markus, 1991;Ross, 1989;Wilson & Ross, 2001;Woodruff & Birren, 1972).…”

“…Similar to Ryff (1991), we used a fixed time difference, in our case 10 years ahead or back in time, to obtain diachronous ratings. This implied that the age groups were not referring to the same periods of the life span when making their judgments.…”

“…We conclude from our reading of the literature that research on diachronous selfevaluations, to date, is characterized by three emphases. First, most studies have been conducted in the field of self and personality characteristics (e.g., Fleeson & Baltes, 1998;Fleeson & Heckhausen, 1997;Ryff, 1991;Ryff & Heincke, 1983;Wilson & Ross, 2001).…”

Impacto na qualidade de vida e no estado depressivo de idosas participantes de uma universidade da terceira idade

“…Alguns estudos mostraram que as dimensões de personalidade podem estar relacionadas aos índices de resiliência e bem-estar subjetivo (Ryff, 1991;Staudinger, Marsiske & Baltes, 1993), além de desencadeamento de sintomas depressivos (Costa, McCrae & Zonderman, 1987;Costa et al, 2000;Diener & Diener, 1996;Martin, Valora & Poon, 2002;Small, Herzog, Hultsch & Dixon, 2003;Steunenberg, Beekman, Deeg & Kerkhof, 2006;Watson & Walker, 1996). O bem-estar tem sido considerado por alguns autores como sinônimo de qualidade de vida (Fleck, Chachamovich & Trentini, 2003 Existe uma relação direta entre qualidade de vida e intensidade de sintomas depressivos (Trentini, 2004).…”