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Objectives Some research conceptualizes routineness of daily life as an indicator of cognitive vulnerability that would lead to lower well-being in older age, whereas other research expects routineness to give rise to more meaning and stability in life and thus to higher well-being. Further research is needed to understand routineness in older adults in relation to cognitive abilities and well-being. This study examined routineness of social interactions. Methods We examined data from an event-contingent experience sampling study with 103 Swiss community-dwelling older adults (aged 65 to 84 years). Participants completed in-lab cognitive assessments (reasoning, episodic memory, speed, and vocabulary) and reported their well-being (positive affect, negative affect, and life satisfaction). For more than 21 days, participants reported the time and context of their social interactions (including modality, partner type, and location). Routineness of social interactions was defined as social interactions that occurred at the same time of day over the study period. It was calculated using recurrence quantification analysis. Results Linear regressions showed that higher routineness of social interaction in general, of social interaction through the same modality, and of social interaction with the same partner type were associated with higher positive affect. Higher routineness of social interaction in general was associated with lower negative affect. Routineness of social interactions was not associated with life satisfaction or cognitive abilities. Discussion A routine social life may increase older adults' affective well-being. Results are discussed in the context of activity engagement and time use in older age. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives Although higher activity diversity is associated with higher well-being at the between-person level, it is unknown whether a day with higher activity diversity is related to higher well-being within persons. Within 24 hr per day, there are a limited number of activities on which individuals could spend their time and energy. Personal resources could influence the expenditure of energy and thus the experience with daily activities. This study examined daily associations between activity diversity and well-being and whether age and self-related health moderated the associations. Methods For seven times per day over 2 weeks, 129 retired older adults (M age = 73.9 years, SD age = 5.6) reported their present activity engagement and positive and negative affect. Daily activity diversity was operationalized as the number of different activity types reported per day. Daily positive and negative affect were assessed as the average of a range of high- and low-arousal affective states. Self-rated health was assessed with an item from the 12-Item Short-Form Health Survey at baseline. Results Multilevel models showed that daily activity diversity was unrelated, on average, to daily positive or negative affect at the between- and within-person levels. Daily activity diversity was associated with lower daily positive affect in participants with lower self-rated health, but the Johnson-Neyman regions of significance were outside of the range of observed data. Discussion Divergent patterns were observed in the within-person associations between activity diversity and well-being across participants. Results are discussed in the context of time use and well-being in older age. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: It has been shown that activity engagement is associated with cognitive ability in older age, but mechanisms behind the associations have rarely been examined. Following a recent study which showed short-term effects of activity engagement on working memory performance appearing 6 h later, this study examined the mediating role of affective states in this process. Methods: For 7 times per day over 2 weeks, 150 Swiss older adults (aged 65–91 years) reported their present (sociocognitive/passive leisure) activities and affective states (high-arousal positive, low-arousal positive, high-arousal negative, and low-arousal negative) and completed an ambulatory working memory task on a smartphone. Results: Multilevel vector autoregression models showed that passive leisure activities were associated with worse working memory performance 6 h later. Passive leisure activities were negatively associated with concurrent high-arousal positive affect (and high-arousal negative affect); high-arousal positive affect was negatively associated with working memory performance 6 h later. A Sobel test showed a significant mediation effect of high-arousal positive affect linking the time-lagged relationship between passive leisure activities and working memory. Additionally, sociocognitive activities were associated with better working memory performance 6 h later. Sociocognitive activities were associated with concurrent higher high- and low-arousal positive affect, which, however, were not associated with working memory performance 6 h later. Thus, a mediation related to sociocognitive activities was not found. Discussion: Passive leisure activities could influence working memory performance through high-arousal positive affect within a timeframe of several hours. Results are discussed in relation to an emotional, and possibly a neuroendocrine, pathway explaining the time-lagged effects of affective states on working memory performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: Experimental research suggests that affect may influence prospective memory performance, but real-life evidence on affect-prospective memory associations is limited. Moreover, most studies have examined the valence dimension of affect in understanding the influence of affect on cognitive performance in daily life, with insufficient consideration of the arousal dimension. To maximize ecological validity, the current study examined the relationships between daily affect and daily prospective memory using repeated daily assessments and the role of resting heart rate on these relationships. We examined both valence and arousal of daily affect by categorizing affect into four dimensions: high-arousal positive affect, low-arousal positive affect, high-arousal negative affect, and low-arousal negative affect. Method: We examined existing data collected from community-dwelling couples, of which at least one partner had a stroke history. The analytic sample included 111 adults (Mage = 67.46 years, SD = 9.64; 50% women) who provided 1,274 days of data. Among the participants, 58 were living with the effects of a stroke and 53 were partners. Participants completed daily event-based prospective memory tasks (in morning and/or evening questionnaires), reported daily affect in the evening, and wore a wrist-based Fitbit device to monitor resting heart rate over 14 consecutive days. Results: Results from multilevel models show that, within persons, elevated high-arousal negative affect was associated with worse daily prospective memory performance. In addition, lower resting heart rate attenuated the inverse association between high-arousal negative affect and lowered prospective memory performance. We did not find significant associations of high- or low-arousal positive affect and low-arousal negative affect with daily prospective memory. Discussion: Our findings are in line with the resource allocation model and the cue-utilization hypothesis in that high-arousal negative affect is detrimental to daily prospective memory performance. Lower resting heart rate may buffer individuals' prospective memory performance from the influence of high-arousal negative affect. These findings are consistent with the neurovisceral integration model on heart-brain connections, highlighting the possibility that cardiovascular fitness may help maintain prospective memory into older adulthood. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: Mobility as a multidimensional concept has rarely been examined as a day-to-day varying phenomenon in its within-person association with older adults' daily well-being. This study examined associations between daily mobility and daily well-being in community-dwelling older adults with a set of GPS-derived mobility indicators that were representative of older adults' daily mobility. Methods: Participants wore a custom-built mobile GPS sensor ("uTrail") and completed smartphone-based experience sampling questionnaires on momentary affective states (7 times per day) and daily life satisfaction (in the evening). Analyses included data across 947 days from 109 Swiss older adults aged 65–89 years. Results: Multilevel modeling showed that, within persons, a day with a larger life space area, more time spent in passive transport modes, and a higher number of different locations was associated with higher daily life satisfaction but not daily positive or negative affect. Follow-up analysis showed that the daily maximum distance from home was positively associated with daily life satisfaction, providing a first indication that exposure to non-habitual environments might be a possible underlying mechanism to explain the effects of mobility. Conclusions: Traveling a long distance away from home and visiting diverse locations may be a way to improve life satisfaction. Results are discussed in the context of research on healthy aging. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives While being socially active is beneficial for well-being in older age, it is unclear whether effects of social interactions on well-being indicate "the more the merrier" or if they have limits as individuals socialize more or less across different days. This study addressed diminishing returns to social interaction frequency for well-being. Method We examined data from an event-contingent experience sampling study from 116 Swiss older adults (65 to 94 years old) over 21 days. Participants reported face-to-face social interactions once they occurred and daily well-being (i.e. positive and negative affect, loneliness) in the evenings. Results On average, participants had 2.09 face-to-face social interactions per day. Linear and quadratic effects from multilevel models conjointly indicated that a higher number of daily social interactions was associated with higher daily positive affect and lower daily negative affect and loneliness, but that well-being reached its peak at 2–3 times above participants' typical daily interaction frequency. Once these numbers were surpassed, the benefit of additional social interactions diminished. Additionally, participants who typically had fewer social interactions, were unmarried, lived alone, and had more health conditions showed stronger associations between daily social interaction frequency and well-being. Discussion Our findings suggest the benefits of social interactions on well-being exhibit diminishing returns. Social interactions may play a bigger role in older adults with less satiation for desire to belong and a limited future time perspective. We discuss these findings in terms of the belongingness hypothesis and the socioemotional selectivity theory. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]