In between optimism and pessimism12/26/2023 ![]() There is evidence that personality traits and psychological outlook are malleable throughout life ( Mottus et al., 2012, Smith and Baltes, 1997, Mroczek and Spiro, 2003, Roberts et al., 2005), and that these changes may be due to the effects of significant life-stage experiences, such as career success in mid-life, or death of a spouse in later life ( Roberts & Mroczek, 2008). Individual differences research on personality provides a plausible mechanism through which cognitive ability might be related to optimism and pessimism in older age. Here, we examine the relations between cognitive ability and optimism and pessimism in older age, using data from two independent, narrow-age samples of individuals in their eighth and ninth decades of life. Though dispositional optimism and cognitive function are both considered to be important in older age, the relationship between these factors has received relatively limited attention, and it is unclear to what extent they relate to one another. ![]() Researchers and laypersons agree that maintaining cognitive function is key to aging well ( Bowling, 2007, Cosco et al., 2014c). Preservation of cognitive function has long been a constituent in the conceptualisation of successful aging ( Rowe & Kahn, 1987). The suggested importance of an optimistic outlook for successful ageing reflects the current emphasis on psychosocial factors ( Cosco, Prina, Perales, Stephan, & Brayne, 2014a), and is perhaps unsurprising given the range of outcomes to which optimism has been linked, including social resources, quality of life, and many physical health measures ( Carver and Scheier, 2014, Carver et al., 2010). It has recently been argued that “personal resources such as optimism… are integral to ageing well” ( Cosco, Brayne, & Stephan, 2014, p. Optimism and pessimism are trait-like facets of personality which describe a person's general expectations for good or bad things to happen ( Scheier & Carver, 1985). The results are consistent with differential associations between cognitive functions and optimism and pessimism, and indicate that their associations with cognitive ability are similar in the eighth and ninth decades of life. Cognitive ability was not significantly associated with optimism in bivariate analyses, and after adjustment for covariates had only small associations with optimism and only in the LBC1936. Participants were two independent narrow-age samples of older individuals with mean ages about 73 ( n = 847) and 87 ( n = 220) years from the Lothian Birth Cohorts of 1936 (LBC1936) and 1921 (LBC1921), respectively. In the present study we examined associations between dispositional optimism and pessimism measured in the eighth and ninth decade of life and childhood and older age cognitive ability, and lifetime change in cognitive ability. ![]() It is unclear whether associations found previously between cognitive ability and pessimism in older age, are evident across the life course, and are consistent at different points in older age. However few have studied the relationship between cognitive ability and dispositional optimism and pessimism in older age. Maintaining good cognitive function is important for successful aging, and it has been suggested recently that having and optimistic outlook may also be valuable. ![]()
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