ArticleThe American psychologist2021
Historical change in midlife health, well-being, and despair: Cross-cultural and socioeconomic comparisons.
Article in The American psychologist, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 30 papers.
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Who cites it
30 citing papers in PubMed.
- Are Daily Well-Being and Emotional Reactivity to Stressors Modifiable in Midlife?: Evidence from a Randomized Controlled Trial of an Online Social Intelligence Training Program.Prevention science : the official journal of the Society for Prevention Research · 2023Trial
- Gendered experiences of cause-specific unmet medical need: An intersectional analysis using MAIHDA.SSM - population health · 2026Article
- Do Temporal Changes in Complete Tooth Loss Point to Cohort Effects?Community dentistry and oral epidemiology · 2026Article
- Optimizing accelerometer implementation in a gerotherapeutic trial: Feasibility, adherence, and operational insights of ABLE.PLOS digital health · 2026Article
- Loneliness, positive social interactions, and diurnal cortisol among mid-to-later life adults in everyday life.Biological psychology · 2026Article
- Age-Specific Association Between Urinary Phthalate Metabolites and Diabetes Mellitus: Findings from the Korean National Environmental Health Survey Cycle 4 (2018-2020).Healthcare (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Article
- Pain during midlife: a cross-national analysis of cohort differences in reports of pain in the United States, Europe, South Korea, and Mexico.American journal of epidemiology · 2026Article
- Historical change in midlife trajectories of self-reported sensory functioning across 16 nations.The Gerontologist · 2026Article
- Historical Change in Midlife Development from a Cross-National Perspective.Current directions in psychological science · 2026Article
- Uncovering mechanisms of historical change in midlife loneliness across the United States and Europe: a focus on physical activity, health conditions, and wealth.The journals of gerontology. Series B, Psychological sciences and social sciences · 2026Article
- Article
- Social determinants of health and age-related differences in all-cause mortality: evidence from National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey.Annals of medicine · 2025Article
- Development and validation of the concise midlife crisis measure.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- Midlife blues: A lifespan perspective on midlife depressive symptoms.Psychology and aging · 2025Article
- Perceived stress shapes symptom and social network dynamics: a network analysis of depression, anxiety, and relationship-specific support and strain.BMC psychiatry · 2025Article
- What are we modeling? An evaluation of depressive symptom trajectory models from adolescence to early midlife in the Add Health cohort.Social science research · 2025Article
- Trends in Multiple Chronic Conditions Among US Adults, By Life Stage, Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System, 2013-2023.Preventing chronic disease · 2025Article
- Educational disparities in 20-year trajectories of psychological well-being in a national sample.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- Trajectories of episodic memory in midlife: Historical change from a cross-country perspective.Psychology and aging · 2025Article
- Midlife Women's Misaligned Educational Expectations and Serious Mental Illness.Society and mental health · 2025Article
Corrections and comments
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4 authors.
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Abstract
Recent empirical evidence has documented that U.S. middle-aged adults today are reporting lower mental and physical health than same-aged peers several decades ago. Individuals who attained fewer years of education have been most vulnerable to these historical changes. One overarching question is whether this phenomenon is confined to the U.S. or whether it is transpiring across other high-income and upper-middle-income nations. To examine this question, we use nationally representative longitudinal panel data from 5 nations across different continents and cultural backgrounds (U.S., Australia, Germany, South Korea, and Mexico). Results revealed historical improvements in physical health for people in their 40s and early 50s across all five nations. Conversely, the direction of historical change in mental health vastly differed across nations. Later-born cohorts of U.S. middle-aged adults exhibit worsening mental health and cognition. Australian middle-aged adults also experienced worsening mental health with historical time. In contrast, historical improvements for mental health were observed in Germany, South Korea, and Mexico. For U.S. middle-aged adults, the protective effect of education diminished in later-born cohorts. Consistent across the other nations, individuals with fewer years of education were most vulnerable to historical declines or benefited the least from historical improvements. We discuss potential reasons underlying similarities and differences between the U.S. and other nations in these historical trends and consider the role of education. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved).
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