PREDICTORS OF WELL-BEING IN VERY OLD AGE

Abstract

Research on oldest old and centenarians has demonstrated that very old age is associated with enormous negative changes in various domains of functioning. The Berlin Aging Study (Baltes & Mayer, 1999), the Danish Longitudinal Centenarian Study (Andersen-Ranberg, Schroll, & Jeune, 2001) and also the Heidelberg Centenarian Study (Becker, Rott, d’Heureuse, Kliegel, & Schönemann-Gieck, 2003; Rott, d’Heureuse, Kliegel, Schönemann, & Becker, 2001) have revealed that physical frailty and chronic conditions are very common at the age of 100 years and above (cf. Jeune, 2002). There is also converging evidence that the prevalence rate of dementia is at least 50% beyond the age of 95 years (Hagberg, Alfredson, Poon, & Homma, 2001; Kliegel, Moor, & Rott, 2004). In addition to the losses in physical and cognitive functioning the social network is substantially reduced (Antonucci, 2001; Rook & Schuster, 1996). The Georgia Centenarian Study showed that being widowed and having lost a child is the fate of the majority of centenarians (Martin et al., 1992). Although older individuals seem to be characterised by high levels of resilience allowing positive adaptation under adverse circumstances (Staudinger & Fleeson, 1996), the accumulating negative conditions in very old age represent a serious challenge to mental health and subjective well-being (SWB). Applying a diathesis–stress model to examine the prevalence of psychopathology in later life, Gatz (1998) hypothesised that age-related stressful life circumstances such as loss of social partners or chronic illness deplete the individual’s affective reserve capacity (i.e. plasticity in affect resulting from regulatory competence) which endangers the individual to develop depressive symptoms or a manifest depression. In line with this assumption, even the highly positively selected participants of the Georgia Centenarian Study revealed more depressive symptoms than representative samples of sexagenarians and octogenarians (Martin, Rott, Kerns, Poon, & Johnson, 2000). Staudinger and Fleesen (1996) posited that, especially, extreme physical constraints appear to limit resilience. Some authors even suspect that the individual’s capacity for adaptation would break down in extremely old age, resulting in a phenomenon called “psychological mortality” which is characterised by loss of intentionality, personal identity and psychological control over one’s future as well as the chance to live and die in dignity (Baltes & Smith, 2003).