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Global life satisfaction predicts ambulatory affect, stress, and cortisol in daily life in working adults

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Abstract

Global life satisfaction has been linked with long-term health advantages, yet how life satisfaction impacts the trajectory of long-term health is unclear. This paper examines one such possible mechanism—that greater life satisfaction confers momentary benefits in daily life that accumulate over time. A community sample of working adults (n = 115) completed a measure of life satisfaction and then three subsequent days of ecological momentary assessment surveys (6 times/day) measuring affect (i.e., emotional valence, arousal), and perceived stress, and also provided salivary cortisol samples. Multilevel models indicated that people with higher (vs. lower) levels of life satisfaction reported better momentary affect, less stress, marginally lower momentary levels and significantly altered diurnal slopes of cortisol. Findings suggest individuals with high global life satisfaction have advantageous daily experiences, providing initial evidence for potential mechanisms through which global life satisfaction may help explain long-term health benefits.

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Acknowledgments

Partial support for the collection of data was provided by the Gallup Organization.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Biobehavioral Health & Medicine, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA, 16802, USA

    Joshua M. Smyth

  2. Psychological Sciences, University of California, Merced, CA, USA

    Matthew J. Zawadzki

  3. Department of Biobehavioral Health, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA, USA

    Vanessa Juth

  4. Division of General Internal Medicine, College of Medicine, The Pennsylvania State University, Hershey, PA, USA

    Christopher N. Sciamanna

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  1. Joshua M. Smyth
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Correspondence to Joshua M. Smyth.

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Joshua M. Smyth, Matthew J. Zawadzki, Vanessa Juth, and Christopher N. Sciamanna declares that they have no conflict of interest.

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All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards. Informed consent was obtained from all patients for being included in the study

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Smyth, J.M., Zawadzki, M.J., Juth, V. et al. Global life satisfaction predicts ambulatory affect, stress, and cortisol in daily life in working adults. J Behav Med 40, 320–331 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10865-016-9790-2

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