The relationship between assimilation and the well-being of immigrant children has been the focus of debate in the recent sociological literature. Much of this work has questioned whether classical theories of immigrant adaptation, which assumed assimilation to be an integral part of the process of upward mobility for immigrants, are still applicable to today's immigrant… Continue reading Is assimilation theory dead? The effect of assimilation on adolescent well-being

Wholistic perspectives on differential change focus on multiple-indicator information at a person level. They supplement the modeling of average trajectories at a variable level. The authors extended cross-sectional work in the Berlin Aging Study (J. Smith & P. B. Baltes, 1997) to 6-year longitudinal cluster analyses (n = 132). At baseline, 3 subgroups were identified… Continue reading A Systemic-Wholistic Approach to Differential Aging: Longitudinal Findings From the Berlin Aging Study

Using 12-year longitudinal data from deceased participants of the Berlin Aging Study (N = 414; age 70-103 years, at first occasion; M = 87 years, SD = 8.13), the authors examined whether and how old and very old individuals exhibit terminal decline in reported life satisfaction at the end of life. Relative to age-related decline,… Continue reading Decline in life satisfaction in old age: Longitudinal evidence for links to distance-to-death

This study examined competing hypotheses about dynamic cross-domain associations between perceptual speed and well-being in advanced old age. We applied the bivariate dual change score model (J. J. McArdle & F. Hamagami, 2001) to 13-year incomplete longitudinal data from the Berlin Aging Study (P. B. Baltes & K. U. Mayer, 1999; N = 516, 70-103… Continue reading Well-being affects changes in perceptual speed in advanced old age: Longitudinal evidence for a dynamic link

This paper addresses the question of how the adequacy of a person's employment status influences their health. We draw on and extend the Labor Utilization Framework to distinguish between different forms of underemployment (hours, income, skills, and status) and test their relative effects on a range of physical health and psychological well-being outcomes. Using data… Continue reading Underemployment: Consequences for the Health and Well-Being of Workers

This paper investigates the link between disability and subjective wellbeing, using data from the 2009 Disability and Use of Time supplement to the Panel Study of Income Dynamics, the longest running national panel study in the United States. Disability is construed broadly to include both the presence of any physical, cognitive, or sensory impairment or… Continue reading Disability, participation, and subjective wellbeing among older couples

Children who experience multiple transitions in family structure may face worse developmental outcomes than children raised in stable, two-parent families, and perhaps even worse than children raised in stable, single-parent families—a point denoted in much prior research. Multiple transitions and negative child outcomes, however, may be associated through common causal factors such as parents' antecedent… Continue reading Family Instability and Child Well-Being