Abstract
This study assesses the relationship between age and two dimensions of subjective well-being—evaluative and emotional—among mature adults from five low-and middle-income countries. We use data from the World Health Organization’s Study on Global AGEing and Adult Health to contrast the associations of age with subjective well-being when controlling only for gender with the corresponding partial associations when including a richer set of covariates. Adjusting only for gender, we find negative associations of age with evaluative well-being, while the corresponding age gradients for emotional well-being are relatively flat. By contrast, adjusting for further socio-demographic factors results in positive associations of age with both evaluative and emotional well-being. Oaxaca-Blinder decompositions allow us to explore the roles of two factors to account for any unadjusted age differences in subjective well-being: age-group differences in individual characteristics and life circumstances, and age-specific associations of individual characteristics and life circumstances with subjective well-being. While adverse circumstances such as poor health and low income contribute to lower levels of evaluative well-being among older adults, age per se is—ceteris paribus—positively associated with subjective well-being. Even in poorer countries, older age does not need to be a time of low subjective well-being. Policies aimed at preserving income and limiting or compensating old-age disability appear to be key for maintaining subjective well-being among older adults.
Highlights
Individuals’ assessments of their own subjective well-being have recently become central inputs to evaluations of social conditions and human development (Dolan et al 2011; Stiglitz et al 2009)
For each measure of the two dimensions of subjective well-being, i.e., evaluative and emotional, we aim to answer four specific questions: (1) Compared to middle-aged individuals, do older individuals experience higher or lower subjective well-being? (2) Do potential age differences in subjective well-being change when individual characteristics and life circumstances such as family status, health or income are taken into consideration? (3) To what extent do these age-related differences in individual characteristics and life circumstances explain potential differences in subjective well-being between older and middleaged persons? (4) Are older adults better or worse than their middle-aged counterparts at maintaining their subjective well-being in the face of challenging life circumstances such as ill health or poverty?
The estimation results from our gender-adjusted models using the pooled data from all countries show that—adjusting for gender and country only—evaluative well-being is lower in older age groups than in middle-aged adults
Summary
Individuals’ assessments of their own subjective well-being have recently become central inputs to evaluations of social conditions and human development (Dolan et al 2011; Stiglitz et al 2009). These measures complement traditional indicators of economic performance and social progress. Despite remaining concerns regarding the validity of such self-reported subjective well-being measures, there is growing evidence that subjective assessments of individuals’ own well-being and psychological/mental state are related to other objective indicators of health and well-being such as biological markers and health outcomes, which has led to increasing confidence in their usefulness as a complementary indicator for measuring social progress (Krueger and Stone 2014). Beyond capturing distinct, yet complementary aspects of subjective well-being, evaluative and emotional well-being differ with respect to their antecedents and consequences (Kahneman and Riis 2005), and often show different associations with individual characteristics and life circumstances (Deaton and Stone 2013; Kahneman and Deaton 2010; Kapteyn et al 2015; Knabe et al 2010; Stone et al 2010)
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