Does positivity operate when the stakes are high? Health status and decision making among older adults.
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Research and theory suggest that emotional goals are increasingly prioritized with age. Related empirical work has shown that, compared with younger adults, older adults attend to and remember positive information more than negative information. This age-related positivity effect has been eliminated in experiments that have explicitly demanded processing of both positive and negative information. In the present study, we explored whether a reduction of the preference for positive information over negative information appears when the material being reviewed holds personal relevance for the individual. Older participants whose health varied from poor to very good reviewed written material prior to making decisions about health related and non-health-related issues. As predicted, older adults in relatively poor health (compared with those in relatively good health) showed less positivity in review of information while making health-related decisions. In contrast, positivity emerged regardless of health status for decisions that were unrelated to health. Across decision contexts, those individuals who focused more on positive information than negative information reported better postdecisional mood and greater decision satisfaction. Results are consistent with the theoretical argument that the age-related positivity effect reflects goal-directed cognitive processing and, furthermore, suggests that personal relevance and contextual factors determine whether positivity emerges.
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Although aging itself is not associated with decline in affective functioning, aged individuals, compared with the young, are more vulnerable to depressive symptoms associated with physical illnesses and life events.
“Although aging itself is not associated with decline in affective functioning, aged individuals, compared with the young, are more vulnerable to depressive symptoms associated with physical illnesses, and life events (English and Carstensen, 2015;Fiske et al, 2009Fiske et al, , 2013)).”
From Microglia Priming with Aging and Stress (2017) · cites this paper as English and Carstensen, 2015
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- Authors
- English, T., & Carstensen, L. L.
- Affiliations
- Washington University in St. Louis (US)
- Stanford University (US)
- Venue
- Psychology and Aging
- Published
- 2015-06
- Volume
- 30
- Issue
- 2
- Pages
- 348-355
- ISSN
- 0882-7974 (ISSN-L)
- 1939-1498
- PMC
- PMC4451383
- OpenAlex
- W2323922395
- Cited by
- 65
- References
- 28
- Citations by year
- 2026: 5 · 2025: 5 · 2024: 3 · 2023: 2 · 2022: 9 · 2021: 10 · 2020: 8 · 2019: 5 · 2018: 4 · 2017: 7 · 2016: 5 · 2015: 2
- FWCI
- 10.88
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- hybrid
- doi.org
- Locations
- Psychology and Aging (publishedVersion, other-oa)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- PubMed Central (acceptedVersion)
- Funders
- National Institute on Aging (R37-AG008816; F32-AG034783)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Neuropsychology and Physiological Psychology › Aging and Gerontology Research
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Applied Psychology › Optimism, Hope, and Well-being
- Social Sciences › Decision Sciences › General Decision Sciences › Decision-Making and Behavioral Economics
- Keywords
- positivity effect, older adults, health status, decision-making, emotional goals, personal relevance, decision satisfaction, age differences
- MeSH terms
- Optimism, Affect, Age Factors, Aged, Aged, 80 and over, Aging, Cognition, Decision Making, Female, Goals, Health Status, Humans, Male, Middle Aged, Personal Satisfaction, Self Psychology
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