Social Psychological Correlates Of Occupational Conditio

这个项目的中心是对SSES设计的广泛的纵向调查的分析，该纵向调查是在1964年、1974年和1994年采访的具有全国代表性的美国样本。我们测试的假设是，随着年龄的增长，社会结构决定的环境条件，如复杂性，如何继续影响认知功能、自主的自我定向、对自己和所处环境的感觉，以及心理和身体健康。利用1994年的访谈数据，我们证实，即使在晚年，工作的自我定向对智力功能和定向的自我定向也有积极的影响(定义为一个人？S对自己和他人的看法在多大程度上反映了个人自主性和效能感的重要性)。此外，最近的发现表明，在做家务或进行需要认知的休闲活动的同时处理复杂的认知环境需求，对认知功能也有类似的影响。我们还检查了社会环境对老年人的影响？对家务的非认知心理反应，处理经济问题，以及向孩子寻求个人或经济帮助的意愿。其他分析阐明了社会结构和行为相互关系的模式，其背后是社会结构等级中的地位与身体健康之间显著的正向梯度。我们完成的几乎所有分析都提供了证据，表明处于不同社会结构地位的人所处的不同环境所产生的不同心理影响增加了优势和劣势之间的差距。我们假设相同的一般模式将在两组正在进行的分析中成立：一组研究1974年个人的社会结构和心理特征如何预测1994年的焦虑和抑郁，另一组研究这些特征如何预测2001年的死亡率。我们的发现对于从理论上理解心理衰老过程，以及开发有效的干预措施来抵消其一些负面影响都有直接的意义。

This project centers on analyses of an extensive SSES designed longitudinal survey of a nationally representative U.S. sample, interviewed in 1964, 1974 and 1994. We test hypotheses about how, as one grows older, social-structurally determined environmental conditions, such as complexity, continue to affect cognitive functioning, autonomous self-directed orientations, one's feelings about oneself and one's circumstances, as well as mental and physical health. Taking advantage of the data from 1994 interviews, we confirmed that, even late in life, self-directedness of work has a positive effect on intellectual functioning and self-directedness of orientation (defined by the degree to which one?s views of oneself and others reflect the importance of the autonomy and efficacy of the individual). Further recent findings indicate that dealing with cognitively complex environmental demands while doing housework or carrying out cognitively demanding leisure time activities has similar effects on cognitive functioning. We also examined socioenvironmental effects on older individuals? non-cognitive psychological responses to housework, coping with financial problems and willingness to ask their children for personal or financial help. Other analyses elucidated the pattern of social-structural and behavioral interrelationships underlying the striking positive gradient between position in the social-structural hierarchy and physical health. Almost all of our completed analyses provide evidence that the different psychological effects of the differing environments to which people in different social-structural positions are exposed increase disparities between the advantaged and disadvantaged. We hypothesize that the same general pattern will hold in two ongoing sets of analyses: one examining how the social-structural and psychological characteristics of individuals in 1974 predict anxiety and depression in 1994, the other how these characteristics predict mortality through 2001. Our findings have direct implications both for the theoretical understanding of psychological aging processes and for developing effective interventions to counteract some of its negative effects.