CHANGE IN WOMEN'S ROLES & WELL-BEING: AGE-COHORT EFFECTS

本研究将调查具有社会经济和人口统计学代表性的中年妇女的社会角色、个性和幸福感。这项研究利用了800名女性的前瞻性数据，这些女性是随机选择的，平均年龄为31岁，有一个或多个孩子，年龄在1到10岁之间。他们被抽样调查的原始研究的目的仅限于调查他们后代的问题和发育过程；因此，对妇女进行采访是因为她们构成了子女的养育“环境”。最初1975年的访谈集中在家庭背景、工作和健康状况、后代行为和养育子女方面。在随后的访谈中，受访女性的平均年龄分别为39岁、42岁和48岁，访谈内容扩展到女性的性格特征、抑郁、生活目标和婚姻关系。以前没有寻求资金来调查这些数据，目的是了解妇女的发展。本研究的目标是：(1)进行第五波数据收集，以检验女性（平均年龄57岁）所从事的生活角色及其与有效心理功能、抑郁和整体生活满意度的关系；(2)利用所有五波数据来检验个人特征、社会角色和角色转换在预测中年幸福指标方面的相互作用和互动效应。(3)通过比较二战后出生的女性（婴儿潮一代）和在此之前出生的女性（前婴儿潮一代），在相同年龄进行评估，来检验不同队列之间的模式是否存在差异；(4)建立一个数据库，用于现代中年女性中年历程的生命周期模型。

This study will investigate social roles, personality, and well-being in a sample of socioeconomically and demographically representative women over the midlife years. The study capitalizes on prospectively gathered data on 800 women who were randomly selected at a mean age of 31 years when they had one or more children between one and 10 years old. The aims of the original study which they were sampled were limited to investigation of the problems and developmental course of their offspring; thus, the women were interviewed because they constituted the nurturing "environment" of their children. The initial 1975 interviews focused on family background, work and health status, offspring behavior, and parenting. In subsequent interviews, at mean ages 39, 42 and 48, the protocol was expanded to include women's personality characteristics, depression, life goals, and marital relationships. Previous funding has not been sought to investigate those data with a goal of understanding the development of the women. The goals of the proposed study are (1) to undertake a fifth wave of data collection to examine life roles engaged in women (mean age 57) and relationships with effective psychological functioning, depression, and overall life satisfaction, (2) to employ all five waves of data to examine reciprocal and interactive effects of personal characteristics and social roles and role transitions in predicting indicators of well-being across the midlife years, (3) to examine whether patterns differ across cohorts by comparing women born in the post World War II years (baby boomers) with those born before (pre-boomers), assessed at the same age, and (4) develop a data base for a life span model of the course of midlife in modern middle-aged women.