Healthy retirement begins at school: educational differences in the health outcomes of early transitions into retirement

AbstractThe literature on socio-economic variations in the association between retirement timing and health is inconclusive and largely limited to the moderating role of occupation. By selecting the sample case of Mexico where a sizeable number of older adults have no or very little formal education, this study allows the moderating role of education to be tested properly. Drawing on panel data for 2,430 individuals age 50 and over from the Mexican Health and Aging Study (MHAS) and combining propensity score matching models with fixed-effects regressions, this article investigates differences in the health effects of retirement timing between older adults with varying years of education. Subjective health is measured using a self-reported assessment of respondents’ overall health and physical health as a reverse count of doctor-diagnosed chronic diseases. The results indicate that early transitions into retirement are associated with worse health outcomes, but education fully compensates for the detrimental association with subjective and physical health, while adjusting for baseline health, demographics and socio-economic characteristics. In conclusion, formal education during childhood and adolescence is associated with a long-term protective effect on health. It attenuates negative health consequences of early retirement transitions. Policies and programmes promoting healthy and active ageing would benefit from considering the influence of formal education in shaping older adults’ health after the transition into retirement.

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Understanding the Critical Role of Alcohol Consumption in the Linkages Among Older Adults' Depressive Symptoms, Leisure Activities, and Physical Health Outcomes

PsycEXTRA Dataset ◽

10.1037/e625482009-001 ◽

2009 ◽

Author(s):

Rebecca Rueggeberg ◽

Carsten Wrosch ◽

Fatima Amari

Keyword(s):

Older Adults ◽

Depressive Symptoms ◽

Alcohol Consumption ◽

Health Outcomes ◽

Physical Health ◽

Leisure Activities ◽

Critical Role ◽

Physical Health Outcomes

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COVID-19 health worries and anxiety symptoms among older adults: the moderating role of ageism

International Psychogeriatrics ◽

10.1017/s1041610220001258 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 32 (11) ◽

pp. 1371-1375 ◽

Cited By ~ 9

Author(s):

Yoav S. Bergman ◽

Sara Cohen-Fridel ◽

Amit Shrira ◽

Ehud Bodner ◽

Yuval Palgi

Keyword(s):

Older Adults ◽

Physical Health ◽

Social Isolation ◽

Health Anxiety ◽

Anxiety Symptoms ◽

Negative Consequences ◽

Prominent Feature ◽

Age Range ◽

Moderating Role

ABSTRACTA prominent feature of anxiety in late life is concerns regarding physical health. Anxiety symptoms among older adults have been connected with various psychological outcomes, including social isolation and loneliness. During the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, many societies have demonstrated increased ageist attitudes, encouraging older adults to distance themselves from society. Accordingly, the current study examined the moderating role of COVID-19-related ageism in the connection between COVID-19 health worries and anxiety symptoms among older adults. Data were collected from 243 older adults (age range 60–92; M = 69.75, SD = 6.69), who completed scales assessing COVID-19-related health worries and ageism, as well as anxiety symptoms. The results demonstrated that both health worries and ageism were positively associated with anxiety symptoms. Moreover, the connection between health worries and anxiety symptoms was more pronounced among older adults with high ageism levels. The study highlights the vulnerability of older adults in general, and ageist older adults in particular, to the negative consequences of COVID-19-related health worries, and emphasizes the role of the increased ageist stance of society during the pandemic in this regard.

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Nonstandard Employment and Health in South Korea: The Role of Gender and Family Status

Sociological Perspectives ◽

10.1177/0731121418782186 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 61 (6) ◽

pp. 973-999 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Sojung Lim ◽

Sun Young Jeon ◽

Joongbaeck Kim ◽

Hyeyoung Woo

Keyword(s):

South Korea ◽

Health Outcomes ◽

Fixed Effects ◽

Family Status ◽

Nonstandard Employment ◽

Self Employment ◽

Nationally Representative ◽

Time Invariant ◽

Moderating Role

Using nationally representative longitudinal data collected in South Korea from 2006 to 2013, this study evaluates the associations between nonstandard employment and various health outcomes with a focus on gender differences. We also examine to what extent family status, that is, marital status and parenthood, conditions these associations for men and women. Our results reveal an important role of selection in that many of the significantly negative associations between nonstandard/self-employment and health outcomes disappear in fixed-effects models when time-invariant unobserved individual heterogeneity is taken into account. Such negative selection appears to be more pronounced for men than for women. We also find a significant association between nonstandard/self-employment and health, which differs by gender and particular health outcomes examined. As for the moderating role of family status, our results show that mothers do benefit from self-employment in terms of lower depressive symptoms.

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Negative emotion differentiation and long-term physical health—The moderating role of neuroticism.

Health Psychology ◽

10.1037/hea0000809 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 39 (2) ◽

pp. 127-136

Author(s):

Vincent Y. S. Oh ◽

Eddie M. W. Tong

Keyword(s):

Physical Health ◽

Negative Emotion ◽

Emotion Differentiation ◽

Moderating Role

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Dynamics of Multimorbidity Resilience and Health Outcomes Over Time in Community-Residing Older Adults

Innovation in Aging ◽

10.1093/geroni/igaa057.3285 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 4 (Supplement_1) ◽

pp. 890-891

Author(s):

Yingzhi Xu ◽

Zahra Rahmaty ◽

Eleanor McConnell ◽

Tingzhong (Michelle) Xue ◽

Bada Kang ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Older Adults ◽

Health Outcomes ◽

Physical Health ◽

Social Life ◽

Structural Equation ◽

Equation Modeling ◽

Psychological Resilience ◽

Pain Level ◽

Reciprocal Relationships ◽

Over Time

Abstract Multimorbidity resilience may mitigate the adverse effects of multiple chronic diseases on older adults’ health. Wister et al.’s (2018) multimorbidity resilience index was developed and tested in a cross-sectional sample of older adults in Canada. Building on these findings, we examined the reciprocal relationships of resilience on outcomes to test these potentially mitigating effects in a community-based, U.S. sample of older adults over time. The study sample includes 1,054 older adults from waves 2 and 3 of the National Social Life, Health, and Aging Project (NSHAP) study (Waite et al 2020). Wister et al.’s (2018) index was mapped to NSHAP measures, and reciprocal relationships of multimorbidity resilience and health outcomes over a 5-year period was tested using structural equation modeling (SEM). Results indicated significant effects of multimorbidity resilience on self-rated physical health and pain. Interestingly, a better functional resilience at baseline conferred better self-rated physical health at follow-up, while better psychological resilience predicted lower pain level. By contrast, the influence of health outcomes on any domain of multimorbidity resilience was not detectable at all, supporting the direction of these associations from resilience to outcomes. The study systematically investigated the dynamic hypotheses between multimorbidity resilience and health outcomes. That is, whether they are determinants or consequences, or both. Our findings suggest multimorbidity resilience predicts subsequent 5-year change in health outcomes, especially self-rated physical health and pain level, but not vice versa, strengthening the evidence of the importance of resilience in the health of older adults.

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