Aging and attentional bias for death related and general threat-related information: less avoidance in older as compared with middle-aged adults

The Journals of Gerontology. Series B, Psychological Sciences and Social Sciences
Rudi De RaedtRuben Ryckewaert

Abstract

The aging literature suggests that life satisfaction and affective well being stabilizes or even increases during the aging process, and that death anxiety would decrease with aging. Experimental psychology literature shows that emotions play a critical role in information processing. The aim of the current study was to investigate whether death related versus nondeath-related threat words would lead to differential attentional processing in middle aged versus older adults. Twenty-seven older adults between 74 and 90 year and 31 middle-aged adults between 40 and 50 years participated in the study. We used questionnaires to asses death anxiety and an exogenous cueing task to measure attention toward death related versus general threat words. Our results showed no age-related differences in self-reported death anxiety, but less attentional avoidance of threat in older adults. We failed to demonstrate differences between general and death-related threat. This is the first study investigating attentional processing of both death- and threat-related information in older versus younger adults. Less avoidance from threat suggests that with aging, death becomes less of a concern, which might be indicative of acceptance of the own finit...Continue Reading

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Citations

Dec 31, 2015·The Journals of Gerontology. Series B, Psychological Sciences and Social Sciences·John R BluntschliMichael A Kisley
Apr 14, 2016·The Journals of Gerontology. Series B, Psychological Sciences and Social Sciences·Neal KrauseGail Ironson
Jun 19, 2014·Aging & Mental Health·Cindy M de Frias, Erum Whyne
Aug 23, 2016·The Journal of Rural Health : Official Journal of the American Rural Health Association and the National Rural Health Care Association·Santana D VanDyke, Madelynn D Shell
Dec 18, 2013·Qualitative Health Research·Geraldine FoleyOrla Hardiman
Jan 21, 2017·International Journal of Aging & Human Development·Michin HongMee Hye Kim

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