Volume 385, Issue 9968, 14–20 February 2015, Pages 640–648
Series
Subjective wellbeing, health, and ageing
Summary
Subjective
wellbeing and health are closely linked to age. Three aspects of
subjective wellbeing can be distinguished—evaluative wellbeing (or life
satisfaction), hedonic wellbeing (feelings of happiness, sadness, anger,
stress, and pain), and eudemonic wellbeing (sense of purpose and
meaning in life). We review recent advances in the specialty of
psychological wellbeing, and present new analyses about the pattern of
wellbeing across ages and the association between wellbeing and survival
at older ages. The Gallup World Poll, a continuing survey in more than
160 countries, shows a U-shaped relation between evaluative wellbeing
and age in high-income, English speaking countries, with the lowest
levels of wellbeing in ages 45–54 years. But this pattern is not
universal. For example, respondents from the former Soviet Union and
eastern Europe show a large progressive reduction in wellbeing with age,
respondents from Latin America also shows decreased wellbeing with age,
whereas wellbeing in sub-Saharan Africa shows little change with age.
The relation between physical health and subjective wellbeing is
bidirectional. Older people with illnesses such as coronary heart
disease, arthritis, and chronic lung disease show both increased levels
of depressed mood and impaired hedonic and eudemonic wellbeing.
Wellbeing might also have a protective role in health maintenance. In an
analysis of the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing, we identify that
eudemonic wellbeing is associated with increased survival; 29·3% of
people in the lowest wellbeing quartile died during the average
follow-up period of 8·5 years compared with 9·3% of those in the highest
quartile. Associations were independent of age, sex, demographic
factors, and baseline mental and physical health. We conclude that the
wellbeing of elderly people is an important objective for both economic
and health policy. Present psychological and economic theories do not
adequately account for the variations in patterns of wellbeing with age
across different parts of the world. The apparent association between
wellbeing and survival is consistent with a protective role of high
wellbeing, but alternative explanations cannot be ruled out at this
stage.
Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.