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The current longitudinal study examined the predictive associations between the development of future perceptions in adolescence and depressive symptoms in adolescence and early and middle adulthood. Participants (N = 1,527; 48.3% female; broadly representative of Western Germany with respect to race/ethnicity and socioeconomic status) were measured yearly in adolescence at the age of 12 to 16 years and then in adulthood at the age of 35 and 45. Future perceptions were assessed during adolescence, whereas depressive symptoms were assessed at the age of 16, 35, and 45. Three important results stand out. First, the measure of future perceptions functioned equivalently across adolescence. Second, the development of future perceptions during adolescence varied across individuals, though mean-level stability was evidenced in the sample. Third, individual differences in the level and change of future perceptions during adolescence predicted depressive symptoms in adolescence and adulthood. These findings demonstrate that one's perception of the future not only has short-term affective consequences but may have long-term effects on depressive symptoms beyond adolescence.

Background: Given the gendering of engineering roles and competencies, the evidence that the skills required for engineering management are widely referred to as social, and the fact that men engineers are stereotyped as more technical, and women as more social, it might be theorized that (a) those that occupy managerial (vs. technical) roles in engineering are more socially oriented, and (b) that this will especially be the case for women. However, no research has empirically tested the relationship between having socially oriented characteristics and being in managerial roles within the engineering profession, nor have gender differences been examined. Purpose: We test whether social interests and communal goal strivings are linked to engineers' positioning in managerial roles and explore gender as a moderator of these relationships. Additionally, because enterprising interests and agentic goal strivings have been linked to managerial roles in other occupations, we test these as additional predictors of engineers' positioning in managerial roles. Method: In a field survey of 274 industry engineers from multiple organizations and subfields, we tested the relationships described using hierarchical linear regression analysis. Results: Enterprising interests and agentic goals, but not social interests and communal goals, were associated with being in managerial roles, and there were no gender differences in these relationships. Conclusions: Our findings challenge perceptions that managerial roles in engineering, and particularly women's positioning in these roles, are associated with socially oriented tendencies. Findings have implications for research on gender stereotyping and intraoccupational gender segregation in engineering and hold educational implications for curriculum, instruction, and advising.

ObjectivesResearch has demonstrated sense of purpose predicts better health in older adulthood. However, work is limited with respect to understanding how experiencing a health event or illness diagnosis impacts older adults' sense of purpose.MethodThe current study employed a propensity score matching approach to compare older adults who did or did not experience an adverse health event on changes in sense of purpose across 3 waves of the Health and Retirement Study. Sense of purpose was assessed at each wave, and changes were compared between people who did versus did not experience one of 7 diagnoses and health events.ResultsWhen propensity score matching was employed, no differences in trajectories of change for sense of purpose were found with respect to all 7 events. Individual differences in trajectories, however, were evidenced across groups.DiscussionThe current findings suggest that even when health events impact older adults' physical functioning or place limitations on their activity, they may hold little ramifications for their sense of purpose. Future research should consider this potential for resilience, focusing on how adults compensate for losses.

McCrae (2020) argues that it is premature to explore interventions focused on personality change. In his commentary, he suggests that interventions should be promoted only if their effects in self-report data are confirmed by the additional opinion of informants. We agree with the essence of his position and would go further by envisioning a new framework for rigorous collaborative research on personality change (Bleidorn et al., 2020). We nevertheless maintain that policymakers would benefit from considering the additional opinion of personality scientists. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved).

A core attribute of the positive youth development movement has been to nullify negative perceptions of youth's capacities. Toward this end, measurement and classification systems benefit from efforts to view youth's capacities as assets contextualized by developmental potentials and opportunities. In this article, we consider this point with respect to whether youth are purposeful. The prevailing sentiment of some researchers holds that few adolescents have a purpose in life, perhaps reifying negative beliefs about their capacity. We assert an alternative view that focuses on "sense of purpose," which relies on abundant evidence that adolescents generally perceive themselves to be purposeful, thus offering a more inclusive and positive portrayal of young people. This different perspective also opens the door to new opportunities for studying the development of purpose among marginalized adolescents, as well as how interventions may motivate a sense of purpose among youth.

Being securely attached and willing to forgive your partner tends to promote greater relationship success. Though attachment and partner forgiveness are associated cross-sectionally, research has yet to investigate whether and how these positive relationship factors tend to codevelop over time. The current study examined cross-lagged effects and correlated changes in partner forgivingness and attachment across a 2-year period with two measurement occasions (n = 514 individuals). Additionally, dyadic analyses were conducted with a subsample of dyads in the study (n = 149 dyads). Individual level analyses evidenced negative cross-sectional and longitudinal associations between attachment-anxiety and forgivingness. Attachment-avoidance and forgivingness showed significant correlated changes over time. Dyadic level analyses showed that attachment-avoidance predicted partner forgivingness 2 years later but not vice versa. Findings suggest that longitudinal associations between attachment and forgivingness may take different forms at the individual and dyadic level.

Personality traits are powerful predictors of outcomes in the domains of education, work, relationships, health, and well-being. The recognized importance of personality traits has raised questions about their policy relevance, that is, their potential to inform policy actions designed to improve human welfare. Traditionally, the use of personality traits in applied settings has been predicated on their ability to predict valued outcomes, typically under the assumption that traits are functionally unchanging. This assumption, however, is both untrue and a limiting factor on using personality traits more widely in applied settings. In this article, we present the case that traits can serve both as relatively stable predictors of success and actionable targets for policy changes and interventions. Though trait change will likely prove a more difficult target than typical targets in applied interventions, it also may be a more fruitful one given the variety of life domains affected by personality traits. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved).

A minimal amount of information is known about how adolescents and emerging adults construe purpose and meaning in life, leaving many researchers to assume youth think about these constructs consistent with scientific understandings. In this preregistered study, we compared adolescent and emerging adult conceptions of purpose and meaning using directed content analysis. High school and college students were randomly assigned to write about purpose, meaning, or a control topic. Themes mentioned within the written samples did not significantly differ across purpose and meaning conditions, and this pattern did not significantly vary between adolescents and emerging adults. However, many who wrote about meaning mentioned purpose explicitly, suggesting nuanced differentiation. These findings can inform how purpose and meaning are studied and the development of future interventions.

Objective: Examining the personality and well‐being correlates of positive event diversity. Background: Past research has highlighted that personality traits are linked to the frequency of daily positive events. This study is the first to examine positive event diversity, the extent to which positive events are spread across multiple types of positive life domains, as well as its personality and well‐being correlates. Method: We conducted parallel analyses of three daily diary datasets (Ns = 1919, 744, and 1392) that included evening assessment of daily positive events and affective well‐being. The Big Five personality traits were assessed in baseline surveys. Results: Positive Event Diversity was related to higher person‐mean daily positive affect but not negative affect. Higher Extraversion, Agreeableness, Openness, and lower Neuroticism were correlated with more positive event diversity. These associations became nonsignificant when controlling for positive event frequency. Positive event frequency moderated the link between positive event diversity and person‐mean affect, such that higher positive event diversity was associated with higher negative and lower positive affect for people who experienced more frequent positive events. Conclusions: No consistent evidence was found for personality as a moderator of the positive event diversity–well‐being link across the three studies. Further, the well‐being implications of positive event diversity may be better understood when interpreting them alongside indexes of positive event frequency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Given the history of racialized transgressions towards Black adults in the United States and the legacy of forgiveness towards White people despite these transgressions, the current studies examined whether forgivingness is implicated within Black adults’ tendency to engage in activism as a response to discrimination. Study 1 (n = 250) demonstrated that Black adults who reported greater everyday experiences of discrimination were more likely to engage in activism. However, this association was moderated by forgivingness, as it was stronger for those higher on forgivingness. Study 2 (n = 223) asked participants to imagine a potentially racially-charged transgression (a police stop), and then assessed their reactions to the event. Again, forgivingness played a moderating role, insofar that for Black adults higher on forgivingness, the association between perceived discrimination and activist identity was stronger. This research suggests that forgivingness plays a nuanced role in the promotion of activism among marginalized communities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives Cross-sectional studies suggest that individuals who perceive a broader future horizon may be more likely to consider the future consequences of their actions and, as a result, engage in healthy lifestyle behaviors. However, research has yet to consider how this association plays out on the daily level. Methods The present study used daily diary data from a sample of 198 older adults aged 60 years and older (M  = 63.34, SD  = 3.29) to investigate the relationship between daily future time perspective (FTP) and daily health behavior. Participants reported on sociodemographic characteristics during baseline surveys and completed daily diary measures of FTP and health behavior (e.g. nutrition, exercise, social/leisure activity) across 14 days. Multilevel modeling was used to examine within- and between-person associations between daily FTP and health behavior. Results Daily FTP was significantly associated with daily health behavior at the within- but not at the between-person level. Counter to past cross-sectional work, results revealed that individuals showed increased engagement in health behavior on days when they reported a more limited FTP. Discussion Findings highlight the importance of moving beyond the between-person level to consider how FTP fluctuates from day-to-day and relates to health behavior in everyday life. Older adults who view a more limited time horizon may be motivated to increase that future through healthier activities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research into immigrant wellbeing and health has yielded evidence for both potential risks and the capacity for resilience of individuals moving to the United States. Limited research, though, has considered how immigrants may differ in their perceived commitment to a life direction and goals, known as sense of purpose. Moreover, research is needed on whether immigrants may be more likely to derive that purpose through social activism for change. The current study employed a nationwide sample of U. S. adults (N = 1973; 5.3% immigrants), who reported on their sense of purpose, activist purpose, self-rated health, and life satisfaction. Results indicated that immigrants did not significantly differ from native-born U. S. adults on levels for any of the primary variables. Sense of purpose was more strongly associated with life satisfaction for native-born than immigrant participants, although other associations were similar in magnitude across groups. Future research should further explore background predictors of sense of purpose among immigrant samples, as well as whether immigrants and native-born adults differ on alternative forms of purpose. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]