engleski

Daily Activities and Happiness among the Elderly

A great deal of research on happiness has focused on factors that people cannot change, such as their age, gender and personality. Thus, researchers still have little understanding of how happiness fluctuates on a daily basis, and what contributes to those changes. Since one major goal of positive psychology is to consider ways of improving happiness, the focus should shift to things people can change, and one of these things is their lifestyle, time-use in particular. The aim of the paper is to present findings considering daily activities and happiness among the elderly. Particularly, we analyze the differences in happiness between older individuals who are still very active (in terms of engagement in paid or voluntary work ; engagement in senior education programs, hobbies, etc.), and older individuals who have a more passive lifestyle. The data has been collected as part of an ongoing diary study of people involved in a senior education program at the Erasmus University Rotterdam (HOVO) (N=585, Mage=65) . Data was gathered on a monthly basis, using the day reconstruction method (Kahneman et al., 2004), in a three year follow-up study (2006, 2007, and 2008). We present preliminary findings, and discuss them within relevant theoretical frameworks.

day reconstruction method; happiness; daily activities

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