DOI: https://doi.org/10.17072/2078-7898/2021-2-236-249

Attitude to time and age in relation to psychological well-being and health self-assessment at the late ontogenesis stage

Nadezhda S. Pavlova
Ph.D. in Psychology, Researcher

Institute of Psychology of Russian Academy of Sciences,
13, Yaroslavskaya str., Moscow, 129366, Russia;
e-mail: makarachka@mail.ru
ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1518-1137
ResearcherID: AAR-1728-2021

The aim of the work is to study time perspective and subjective age as determinants of psychological well-being and health-related life quality of people at the late ontogenesis stage, leading a different lifestyle. Based on the results of the ZPTI Questionnaire (F. Zimbardo), «Age-of-me» (B. Barak), SF-36 «Health status survey» and «Psychological well-being Scales» (К. Riff) the features of the time perspective, subjective age, health self-assessment and psychological well-being are analyzed in groups of pensioners (58–93 years old) leading a different lifestyle: elderly non-working people who receive home-based social services and elderly non-working people which lead an active lifestyle. It is shown that the categories «time perspective» and «subjective age» express a person’s attitude to time, but relate to different aspects of individuality. Subjective age is more connected with the assessment of physical health status — the physical component of health-related life quality. Time perspective is more connected with personal characteristics — psychological component of health-related life quality; psychological well-being. Self-assessment of health and psychological well-being are closely correlated with the attitude to the present and the past. While the future is in a zone of high uncertainty. The younger the subjective age, the higher the indicators of psychological well-being and health-related life quality. An active lifestyle is a resource that allows pensioners to assess biological and social subjective age younger, be more future-oriented, and have higher indicators of health-related life quality. Health limitations and home lifestyle observed in a reduced health self-assessment and close correlations of all the variables studied. The 65–74 years period, compared to the 58–64 and 75–93 years periods, is characterized by higher indicators of life quality, psychological well-being and the predominance of a balanced time perspective. The main changes in the late-aged people life begin after the age of 75: a decrease in all indicators of health-related life quality and psychological well-being (except for «Autonomy»), as well as an increased focus on the «Fatalistic Present». Thus, the research shows the correlations between attitude to time and age and psychological well-being and health self-assessment. There is almost no study of subjective age in our country. Therefore our work allows us to expand knowledge about subjective age in the Russian sample.

Keywords: well-being aging, time perspective, subjective age, life quality, health self-assessment, psychological well-being, old age, active pensioners, pensioners receiving home-based social services.

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Received: 27.04.2021. Accepted: 25.05.2021

For citation:

Pavlova N.S. [Attitude to time and age in relation to psychological well-being and health self-assessment at the late ontogenesis stage]. Vestnik Permskogo universiteta. Filosofia. Psihologia. Sociologia [Perm University Herald. Philosophy. Psychology. Sociology], 2021, issue 2, pp. 236–249 (in Russian). DOI: https://doi.org/10.17072/2078-7898/2021-2-236-249