OBJECTIVES:Functional impairments among older adults are associated with reduced quality of life and greater healthcare burden. However, how older adults cognitively and emotionally represent these impairments and how such representations relate to behavioral intentions (i.e. intentions to engage in recommended health behaviors) remains underexplored. This study applies the Common Sense Model of Self-Regulation to examine whether representations of impairments are shaped by age-related defensive motivation and how they are associated with behavioral intentions. METHODS:Three hundred one Canadian adults aged 50-95 completed within-person assessments of cognitive and emotional representations across six functional impairments and reported health behavior intentions for each. RESULTS:Older age was associated with more positive emotional representations of functional limitations, and perceived timeline (acute vs chronic impairment) moderated the association between age and consequence representations. Specifically, older adults reported less severe perceived consequences for functional impairments perceived as chronic as compared with those perceived as acute. Timeline representations did not moderate the associations of age with identity, personal control, and treatment control representations. Cognitive representations of functional impairments, in turn, predicted behavioral intentions to manage the functional impairment: more perceived negative consequences, stronger identity representations, and higher perceived treatment control were associated with stronger behavioral intentions, while higher personal control was unexpectedly associated with lower behavioral intentions. A moderated mediation analysis revealed that, for chronic impairments only, older age was associated with lower behavioral intentions to manage a functional impairment through less perceived negative consequences . DISCUSSION:These findings highlight a motivational tradeoff in aging, where emotional self-protection may undermine proactive health behaviors, and suggest it is important to balance emotional self-protection with accurate threat perception.

BACKGROUND:Older men face significant health inequities compared to women, with the transition to retirement often exacerbating these differences. OBJECTIVE:This study explored the benefits of participation in the Squamish Men's Shed (SMS) in British Columbia, Canada. METHODS:Using a case study design, semistructured interviews were conducted with 12 members aged 55 and older. FINDINGS:Thematic analysis identified four overarching themes: A Meaningful Use of Time, The Desire to Give Back, Finding Friendship Within the Shed, and Well-Being as a By-Product. Findings described the Shed as a valuable space to maintain structure and purpose postretirement, foster community engagement, and cultivate social connection. While mental health was rarely an explicit motivation for participation, members described enhanced well-being as an indirect outcome. The Shed also provided opportunities for intergenerational contribution, reinforcing a sense of usefulness and generativity. DISCUSSION:The findings highlight the Shed's potential as a community-based model that promotes men's mental health rather than formalized interventions.

OBJECTIVES:Individuals from historically underrepresented groups, such as sexual minorities, may experience aging in unique ways. This study aimed to examine potential differences in the longitudinal psychological health trajectories (i.e., depressive symptoms, life satisfaction, psychological distress, and self-rated mental health) of heterosexual, lesbian, gay, and bisexual middle-aged and older adults in Canada. METHODS:Longitudinal data across 3 time points spanning up to 10 years were obtained from the Canadian Longitudinal Study on Aging. We applied propensity score matching to compare the trajectories of 1,057 individuals self-identifying as lesbian, gay, or bisexual with 1,057 case-matched heterosexual individuals using linear growth models. RESULTS:At baseline, lesbian individuals reported higher life satisfaction than heterosexual individuals. Gay individuals did not differ in any of the outcomes from heterosexual individuals. Bisexual individuals reported higher depressive symptoms and distress and poorer self-rated mental health than heterosexual individuals. Longitudinal findings show that depressive symptoms, distress, and self-rated mental health decreased, while life satisfaction increased over time among heterosexual individuals. Lesbian individuals showed a dampened increase in life satisfaction compared to heterosexual individuals. No other significant differences in longitudinal psychological health trajectories were observed. DISCUSSION:Lesbian, gay, and bisexual individuals may differ in their aging experiences from heterosexual individuals, but they may not always show poorer psychological health than heterosexual individuals. Notably, findings suggest that bisexual middle-aged and older adults may be more vulnerable to psychological health challenges than individuals self-identifying as lesbian, gay, or heterosexual.

This study aimed to examine whether daily personal time-time spent free from external demands and available for self-directed activities-relates to better affective well-being and healthier cortisol patterns in midlife parents, and whether personality traits moderate these associations. A sample of 318 parents (Mage = 40.06 years, SD = 7.54; 45% men) with underage children (Mage of youngest child = 7.61 years, SD = 5.19) completed up to 8 consecutive days of daily diaries (mood, personal time, stress exposure) and up to 4 days of saliva sampling (4 times/day) for cortisol analysis. Multilevel modeling examined within-person links between personal time, positive and negative affect, and diurnal cortisol slopes, controlling for daily stress. Results showed that on days when they had an opportunity for time to themselves, parents experienced higher positive affect, lower negative affect, and steeper cortisol slopes, indicating better stress recovery. The reduction in negative affect with personal time was stronger for parents high in neuroticism and openness, and high neuroticism was also linked with a stronger association between personal time and cortisol slopes. Findings underscore the potential restorative value of daily time to oneself for midlife parents, particularly those high in neuroticism and openness. In the context of the high demands of parenting, personal time may serve as a valuable resource for emotional renewal, solitude, self-care, self-connection, and recovery from daily parenting stress.

Dyadic interactions of couples are of interest as they provide insight into relationship quality and chronic disease management. Existing sensing systems primarily infer social structure within groups retrospectively, or capture couples’ interactions at random or scheduled times, which could miss meaningful interpersonal interactions between partners. In this work, we developed a smartwatch-based algorithm that detects interaction moments between partners and enables interaction-aware data capture in everyday settings. It uses the Bluetooth signal strength between two smartwatches, each worn by one partner, and a voice activity detection machine-learning model that we trained, to infer that the partners are interacting and then trigger data collection. We operationalized this sensing approach by developing, deploying, and evaluating DyMand, an open-source smartwatch and smartphone system that integrates multimodal sensor and self-report data collection in situ. We deployed the DyMand system in a 7-day field study and collected and analyzed data about social support and diabetes discussions from 13 (N=26) Swiss-based heterosexual couples managing diabetes mellitus type 2 of one partner. Our system evaluation showed that 77.6% of algorithm-triggered recordings contained partners’ conversation moments compared to 43.8% for scheduled triggers, and that DyMand was easy to use. Preliminary insights into disease management behavior revealed that 5.2% of couples’ conversation moments contained social support, and partners discussed diabetes management 2.4% of the time based on the audio data analyses. In contrast, the self-report data showed that patients received support in 67.7% of couples’ interactions and caregivers provided support in 71.8% of couples’ interactions. DyMand enables insights into dyadic behavior in-situ, and could be used by social, clinical, or health psychology researchers to understand the social dynamics of couples that are managing chronic diseases in everyday life to inform the development and delivery of behavioral interventions.

Although social prescribing is a growing global health and social movement, no Delphi studies have determined which outcomes are critical to assess. Our aim was to identify a core outcome set based on feedback from diverse user groups of people who could be affected by (e.g. adults ≥ 60 years) or who can affect (e.g. providers, researchers) social prescribing. METHODS:Following standard guidelines for Delphi studies, we developed a two-round online survey with a focus on Canadian perspectives. We asked participants to rate 21 outcomes as "critical" (7-9 on a 9-point scale), "important but not critical" (4-6 points) or "not important" (1-3 points). We provide a subgroup description of findings from older adult/family and friend perspectives. RESULTS:Round 1 was completed by 74 people from 10 user groups and Round 2 by 52 people from eight user groups (70% retention). Ratings between rounds were generally consistent. Seven outcomes met the "critical" threshold. No outcomes were excluded. Critical outcomes focused on mental health, physical and social functioning, and wellbeing. Participants commented on environmental (e.g. resources, care delivery) and equity factors. CONCLUSION:This study identified seven critical outcomes to consider in evaluations of social prescribing research and interventions. Future investigations should investigate how contextual and personal factors might influence outcomes and identify specific instruments (e.g. questionnaires, performance-based tests) to assess each outcome. Identification of outcomes is a continuous process, requiring regular updates as results may change due the ongoing evolution of social prescribing and other factors.

Couples generally manage chronic diseases together and the management takes an emotional toll on both patients and their romantic partners. Consequently, recognizing the emotions of each partner in daily life could provide insight into their emotional well-being in chronic disease management. Currently, the process of assessing each partner's emotions is manual, time-intensive, and costly. Despite the existence of works on emotion recognition among couples, none of these works have used data collected from couples' interactions in daily life. In this work, we collected 85 h (1021 5-min samples) of real-world multimodal smartwatch sensor data (speech, heart rate, accelerometer, and gyroscope) and self-reported emotion data (n = 612) from 26 partners (13 couples) managing diabetes mellitus type 2 in daily life. We extracted physiological, movement, acoustic, and linguistic features, and trained machine learning models (support vector machine and random forest) to recognize each partner's self-reported emotions (valence and arousal). Our results from the best models-balanced accuracies of 63.8% and 78.1% for arousal and valence respectively-are better than the results from (1) chance, (2) prior work that also used data from German-speaking, Swiss-based couples, and (3) partners' perceptions of each other's emotions. This work contributes toward building automated emotion recognition systems that would eventually enable partners to monitor their emotions in daily life and enable the delivery of interventions to improve their emotional well-being.

IntroductionBien que la prescription sociale constitue un courant de plus en plus important en faveur de la santé globale et de la société, aucune étude Delphi n’a déterminé quels résultats sont essentiels à évaluer. Notre objectif était de faire émerger un ensemble de résultats fondamentaux en fonction des commentaires de divers groupes d’utilisateurs susceptibles d’être concernés par la prescription sociale (aînés de 60 ans et plus) ou de personnes pouvant avoir une influence sur elle (comme les fournisseurs ou les chercheurs). MéthodologieConformément aux lignes directrices normalisées pour les études Delphi, nous avons élaboré une enquête en ligne à deux cycles en ciblant les perspectives canadiennes. Nous avons demandé aux participants d’évaluer 21 résultats comme « cruciaux » (7 à 9 sur une échelle de 9 points), « importants mais non cruciaux » (4 à 6 points) ou « sans importance » (1 à 3 points). Nous présentons une description du sous-groupe de résultats obtenus du point de vue des aînés et de leurs familles et amis. RésultatsLe premier cycle a été complété par 74 personnes relevant de 10 groupes d’utilisateurs et le second par 52 personnes relevant de 8 groupes d’utilisateurs (taux de rétention de 70 %). Les évaluations entre les cycles ont été généralement uniformes. Sept résultats ont atteint le seuil de résultat « crucial ». Aucun résultat n’a été exclu. Les résultats cruciaux portaient sur la santé mentale, le fonctionnement physique et social et le bien-être. Les participants ont formulé des commentaires sur les facteurs contextuels (ressources, prestation de soins, etc.) et les facteurs liés à l’équité ConclusionCette étude a permis de faire émerger sept résultats cruciaux à prendre en compte dans les évaluations en matière de recherche et d’interventions portant sur la prescription sociale. Les recherches futures devraient porter sur la manière dont les facteurs contextuels et personnels ont une influence sur les résultats et elles devraient définir des outils précis (questionnaires, tests axés sur le rendement) pour évaluer chaque résultat. Définir quels résultats sont importants est un processus continu qui nécessite des mises à jour régulières dans la mesure où ces résultats sont susceptibles de changer en fonction de l’évolution de la prescription sociale et d’autres facteurs.

OBJECTIVES:We use continuous-time structural equation modeling (ctSEM) to model physiological influence in couples during a support conversation, capturing the direction and strength of linkage separately for the support provider and recipient. ctSEM accounts for the fact that physiological systems react at different speeds, helping to identify how quickly influence occurs and when it peaks for each system. METHODS:80 Couples took part in a 7-minute support discussion where a support recipient discussed a personal goal with their partner (support provider). Physiological data were recorded using 7 electrocardiogram and 2 electrodermal activity sensors and couples filled out self-report questionnaires pre and post the discussion. ctSEM models were used to analyse physiological influence. RESULTS:Partners showed significant physiological influence in inter-beat interval (IBI) and skin conductance level (SCL), but not in pre-ejection period. IBI influence peaked at a 2-3 s lag (only from support recipient to provider). In contrast, SCL showed mutual influence peaking at 15-16 s. CONCLUSIONS:Our findings show that physiological influence unfolds at different speeds, with IBI co-regulation occurring faster than skin conductance-consistent with known autonomic response patterns. ctSEM proved useful in capturing the timing and direction of these effects, offering a more precise, flexible approach than discrete-time models by modeling the continuous nature of physiological processes. Its ability to identify peak time-lags can help guide future study designs and sampling strategies.

Social connections are crucial for healthy aging, and health disparities are particularly pronounced among sexual minorities. This secondary data analysis investigates longitudinal associations between social relationships and physical health in 1,057 participants of whom 26% identified as lesbian, 50% as gay, and 24% as bisexual people (Mage = 59 years, 38% women, 62% men) and a matched heterosexual control group. Participants reported social support, social isolation, and health behaviors 3 times at 3-year intervals; a subset (n = 665) provided information on psychological distress and physiological assessments. Lesbian, gay, and bisexual adults reported lower social support, higher social isolation, higher psychological distress, and lower physical activity (only men), compared to heterosexual controls. Groups did not significantly differ in nutritional risk or allostatic load. Social vulnerabilities were most prominent among gay and bisexual men as well as bisexual women, but not lesbian women. Controlling for autoregressive effects, we found little evidence for longitudinal associations of social support or social isolation with physical health. However, we found indirect associations between lower social support and subsequent worse physical health (nutritional risk, physical activity, allostatic load) mediated by increased psychological distress (both groups). Findings underscore the need for interventions to increase social belonging, and to address the unique social and physical health challenges of aging sexual minority adults.

Parental well-being is often challenged by the demanding nature of caregiving responsibilities, leaving little opportunity for solitude (i.e., time to oneself). While prior research highlights the benefits of solitude for overall well-being, less is known about how these effects vary based on personality. Solitude may be especially important for parents who are introverted, to help recharge, or high in neuroticism, to manage heightened emotional reactivity. This study aimed to investigate whether personality traits moderate the association between solitude and daily well-being (as indicated by negative affect and cortisol levels) among parents. Data are from 318 parents of underage children (Mage=40.06 years; 45% male, 81% White) in the Refresher Daily Diary subproject of the Midlife Development in the United States Survey. Over 8 days, participants reported daily opportunities for time to themselves, negative affect, and provided saliva samples on days 2–5 to measure cortisol levels. Data were analyzed using multilevel modeling. On days on which participants reported having had time to themselves, they reported lower levels of negative affect (b = -0.05, p = .001) and steeper wake-evening cortisol slopes (b = -0.07, p = .011). Individuals with higher levels of neuroticism showed stronger associations between time to themselves and negative affect (b = -0.06, p = .007) as well as cortisol slopes (b = -0.09, p = .041). Facilitating moments of solitude for parents, especially those high in neuroticism, could serve as an effective strategy for supporting their emotional and physiological health.

Despite the well-known benefits of physical activity, older adults do not engage in sufficient amounts; this became worse during the COVID-19 pandemic. This project analyzes the role of social partners for everyday physical activity, specifically, with whom older adults are physically active and whether engaging in physical activity with a close social tie is associated with more physical activity than when alone or with other members of their social network. One hundred thirty-nine Canadian older adults (M-age = 71.09 years, SDage = 5.38; female: 53%, ethnicity: 88% White) participated in a daily diary study on social support for everyday health behaviors with a study partner (a close tie of their choice). Participants provided background information and completed up to 10 consecutive evening questionnaires reporting their daily minutes of moderate to vigorous physical activity, daily steps, and who they were active with. Results show that participants reported less physical activity when engaging in it alone and reported more when being active with their study partner than with other social network members or alone. This was the case across both modalities (minutes and steps). When zooming in on who the study partner was (romantic partner, friend, or other type of close social tie), being active with a romantic partner and friend was positively associated with more physical activity. When comparing average levels of physical activity across study partner categories, friends had the highest average. However, when looking at frequency of occurrence, physical activity with a romantic partner occurred most often. Findings underscore the importance of recognizing the potential of social partners to facilitate physical activity in everyday life (during times of chronic stress).

Positive events are common in daily life (e.g., having a good conversation) and savoring strategies can be used to up-regulate positive emotions. Drawing from Socioemotional Selectivity Theory, individuals with relatively less positive views of aging (VoA) might attend more to positive and meaningful experiences in the present as a function of shifting time perspective. Therefore, we hypothesized that people with less positive VoA would derive more positive affect from savoring their positive experiences. This pre-registered study analyzed experience sampling data from an adult lifespan sample from Canada (n = 178 persons and 14 days, Mage=47) and an older adult sample from Switzerland (n = 108 persons and 7 days, Mage=73). VoA were measured through attitudes toward own aging and age stereotypes, while savoring and positive affect were assessed at the end of each day. Two-level multilevel models revealed that positive affect was higher on days with more-than-usual savoring (Canada sample: b = 0.16, 95% CI[0.03, 0.30], p=.019; Switzerland sample: b = 0.42, 95% CI[0.35, 0.49, p<.001). VoA moderated the link between savoring and positive affect in the Swiss sample only, such that individuals with less positive VoA had smaller upticks in positive affect associated with savoring (simple slope for -1 SD: b = 0.34, SE = 0.05, p<.001), compared to those with more positive VoA (simple slope for +1 SD: b = 0.49, SE = 0.05, p<.001). Findings suggest that older adults with more positive VoA may benefit more from savoring, but it remains unclear whether VoA hold the same importance for savoring among younger and middle-aged adults.

OBJECTIVE:This study investigated savouring as a moderator of affect reactivity to daily events among older adults. METHOD:A sample of 108 individuals aged 65-92 years (M = 73.11, SD = 5.92; 58% women) completed daily diary questionnaires over 14 days, reporting on daily stressors, positive events, savouring, and positive and negative affect. RESULTS:Multilevel models showed that on days when a stressor was experienced, negative affect was higher when daily savouring (within-person) was low, but this association was not observed when daily savouring was high. Additionally, on days with positive events, negative affect was lower when trait savouring (between-person) was high, but this effect was not found when trait savouring was low. DISCUSSION:The findings highlight the importance of savouring as a key factor in managing emotional responses to daily experiences among older adults. Specifically, deliberately engaging with positive experiences might buffer daily negative emotional responses.

This study examines intra- and interindividual differences in everyday goal pursuit in older adults focusing on the role of emotions and goal representations. Assuming a prioritization of self-preservation in old age, we expected that reduced negative (and elevated positive) emotions would be associated with increased everyday goal pursuit. These links were expected to be moderated by goal representations such that positive emotions would be more strongly linked to greater goal pursuit when goals were represented as hopes, whereas negative emotions would be less strongly linked to reduced goal pursuit when goals were represented as fears. We used up to 21 surveys from 236 individuals collected over 7 days (Age: Mean = 70.5, 60–87 years). Multilevel models revealed that more intense positive emotional experiences and less intense negative emotional experiences were each associated with elevated everyday goal pursuit. As expected, hoped-for goals were associated with stronger positive emotion–goal pursuit associations. Feared goals were associated with weaker negative emotion (particularly worry)–goal pursuit links. Moderations were limited to the most salient goal. These findings provide insights into how everyday emotion dynamics and goal pursuit may be shaped by the way older adults represent their goals. Evidence from repeated daily life assessments from community-dwelling older adults reveals that more intense positive emotional experiences and less intense negative emotional experiences were each associated with elevated everyday goal pursuit. Relationships varied based on hoped-for versus feared goals.

Leisure activities may protect cognitive performance in older age, but the underlying mechanisms are not well understood. This study examined the short-term time-lagged associations between leisure activities that are minimally physically active (e.g., meeting friends; hereinafter referred to as "leisure activities") and working memory, and whether affect and the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis (i.e., cortisol) mediate such associations. We examined 7,928 observations provided by 235 participants (aged 56-88 years, 49% women) from the German socioeconomic panel. Over 7 days, participants reported their leisure activities and affect (i.e., valence and arousal), completed an ambulatory working memory task, and provided saliva samples five times per day. Results from multivariate multilevel time series analyses show that a bout of leisure activity (that happened within the recent 3 hr) was associated with subsequent better working memory performance as captured 6 hr later, but not 3 hr later or at the same time. Moreover, high- and low-arousal positive affect and low-arousal negative affect mediated the temporal association. That is, a bout of leisure activity was associated with concurrent more high- and low-arousal positive affect and less low-arousal negative affect, which were associated with subsequent better working memory performance. In contrast, high-arousal negative affect and cortisol did not mediate the association. In addition, we observed heterogeneity across participants and reported generalizability of our hypothesis on leisure activities that are physically active (e.g., walking). In conclusion, engagement in leisure activities may have short-term benefits for working memory performance by enhancing affective well-being. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).