SOCIAL AND BEHAVIORAL CONTEXTS OF THE AGING MIND

University Of Wisconsin Madison, Madison WI

Investigators

Linked publications, trials & patents

Abstract

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): This research will identify and estimate reciprocal relationships between specific social and behavioral contexts and psychological functioning in an aging population. Our interest in psychological functioning is not limited to cognition, but also includes related aspects of individuals' psychological lives, especially symptoms of mental disorder and psychological well-being. The research will encompass two general features of social context (everyday social and intellectual engagement; the experience of stressors); and one specific behavioral context (alcohol use). In each of these three domains, we seek to explicate how differences in psychological functioning may be both a cause and consequence of differences in life contexts. The overarching goal is to understand both how contextual factors affect psychological functioning among older adults and how psychological factors contribute to differences in the social, and behavioral, contexts of older adults' lives. Such reciprocal relationships can only be elaborated satisfactorily with longitudinal data. This project will exploit existing and new data collected in the Wisconsin Longitudinal Study (WLS), which has followed a cohort of some 10,000 Wisconsin high school graduates--and more than 5000 of their sisters and brothers--from 1957 to the present. The wealth of contextual information already available in the WLS positions it to contribute importantly and uniquely to the understanding of sources and patterns of change in psychological functioning with age.