For better and for worse: the relationship between future expectations and functioning in the second half of life

To examine age group differences in the relationship between future expectations about standards of living and physical, mental, and cognitive functioning in the second half of life.

Data from the Survey of Health, Ageing, and Retirement in Europe (N=27,687, mean age=64.44).

First, with increasing age, the expectation to improve (ETI) and the expectation to worsen (ETW) in standards of living became more independent of each other. Second, with increasing age, ETI was less strongly correlated with functioning whereas ETW was more strongly correlated with it. Third, with increasing age, the relationship between ETI and functioning was more strongly moderated by ETW, so that adaptive functioning was associated with expectations that no major change is to occur and with expectations for both growth and decline.

Late-life positive and negative expectancies are less interdependent than they are in younger age, probably due to their stronger interaction when associating with functioning. Expectancies interact either to reflect an attempt to preserve the functional status quo (low expectancy to improve and to decline) or may signal a highly complex mental organization (high expectancy to improve and to decline).