From Day to Day to Year to Year: Developmental Antecedents and Outcomes of Changes in Emotion

Research shows that emotions play an important role in successful aging. However, less is known about how day-to-day fluctuations and multi-year changes in positive and negative emotions are implicated in adaptive development. Thus, the present studies address the developmental antecedents and outcomes of micro- and macro-longitudinal changes in different positive and negative emotions. Blöchl, Oertzen, and Kunzmann use 12-year data from the Health and Retirement Study to examine whether socioeconomic resources influence trajectories of positive emotion and physical functioning and their interrelations. Hamm, Wrosch, Barlow, and Kunzmann investigate psychosocial and health-related resources that predict two-year stability and change in adaptive and maladaptive daily patterns of calmness, excitement, sadness, and anger. Pauly et al. examine the extent to which health status moderates the association between daily fluctuations in seven affective states and corresponding changes in stress-related cortisol secretion. Turner, Mogle, Hill, Bhargava, and Rabin study how positive and negative emotions experienced in response to daily challenges (memory lapses) mediate the association between age-related challenges and life satisfaction in a coordinated analysis of two datasets. Finally, Barlow addresses the extent to which variations in daily experiences of positive and negative emotions exhibit age-differential associations with daily satisfaction with life (i.e., emotion globalizing). This symposium thus integrates new research on emotional aging and contributes to a deeper understanding of how adaptive development shapes and is shaped by day-to-day fluctuations and long-term changes in different emotions.

Developmental antecedents of cleansing effects: Evidence against domain-generality

Lee and Schwarz propose grounded procedures of separation as a domain-general mechanism underlying cleansing effects. One strong test of domain generality is to investigate the ontogenetic origins of a process. Here, we argue that the developmental evidence provides weak support for a domain-general grounded procedures account. Instead, it is likely that distinct separation procedures develop uniquely for different content domains.

Developmental antecedents of social anhedonia: The roles of early temperament and sex

Social anhedonia is well established as a transdiagnostic factor, but little is known about its development. This study examined whether temperament and parenting in early childhood predict social anhedonia in early adolescence. We also explored whether the relationships between early predictors and social anhedonia are moderated by a child's sex. A community sample of children participated in laboratory observations of temperament and parenting practices at age 3 (n = 275). The participants returned at age 12 and completed the Anticipatory and Consummatory Interpersonal Pleasure Scale–Child Version (ACIPS-C). Our results indicated that, at age 3, lower observed sociability predicted higher levels of social anhedonia at age 12. These associations were moderated by child sex, such that males with diminished sociability reported greater social anhedonia. These findings indicate that predictors of early adolescent social anhedonia are evident as early as 3 years of age. However, these effects were evident only for males, suggesting that the pathways to social anhedonia in early adolescence differ as a function of sex.