Mediators of Functional Disability at Mid- and Late-Life.

As the number and proportion of older adults living in the U.S. increases, growing evidence shows that people are entering late life with more functional disability than in previous generations.

Planning for Program Evaluation Improves Implementation and Assessment.

This article offers a general approach to plan and implement an educational program by illustrating the evaluation process and data from the AGE-ADAR Scholars Program. A well-designed program evaluation will also include a plan for stakeholder dissemination. We adapted a framework from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention which includes hard and soft outcomes.

Developing, implementing, and evaluating the visiting Neighbors' program in rural Appalachia: A quality improvement protocol.

Introduction: Older adults living alone in rural areas frequently experience health declines, social isolation, and limited access to services. To address these challenges, our medical academic university supported a quality improvement project for developing and evaluating the Visiting Neighbors program in two rural Appalachian counties. Our Visiting Neighbors program trained local volunteers to visit and guide rural older adults in healthy activities.

Health Disparities Among Older Adults: An Introduction to the Special Issue.

The problem of health disparities across the lifespan and in older adulthood has gained recent attention by the National Institute on Aging (NIA) and other organizations and researchers. These disparities are of significant interest as they greatly impact health, life span, and quality-of-life for countless individuals and create economic burden on societies. Given the critical nature of this problem, this special issue will focus on health disparities for older adults across the lifespan.

Introduction to the Special Issue on Advancing Diversity in Aging Research.

The following papers represent an early contribution of the National Institute on Aging's commitment to support high-quality research and mentor a more diverse workforce in the field of aging. has previously issued calls for such scholarship and has provided opportunities to share some of their teaching techniques that foster and support the next generation of gerontologists. In this issue, we feature both lessons learned from those who design and supervise National Institute of Aging-supported training programs and we highlight some of the work that these diverse scholars are contributing to the field.

Grandchildren as Caregivers: Adding a New Layer to the Sandwich Generation.

Although 10% of family caregivers are grandchildren, only a few studies have examined the experience of grandchildren who provide care to grandparents. The current study examined the caregiving processes and outcomes of grandchild caregivers to grandparents. Participants were (  =  5,778) adults identified as a caregiver, including 311 adult grandchildren.

The DAS-6: A Short Form of the Dementia Attitudes Scale.

Attitudes toward persons with dementia (PWD) are important predictors of emotional and behavioral outcomes for PWD and their caregivers. It is often desirable to have short, psychometrically-sound measures of such attitudes for inclusion in large community-based surveillance surveys and quick training assessments. The Dementia Attitudes Scale (DAS) is a 20-item scale that examines person-centered knowledge and perceptions of comfort working with PWD.

Religious and Spiritual Growth Goals: A Forgotten Outcome.

Religious and spiritual (R/S) growth goals have been forgotten among self-improvement goals. We used social cognitive theory, useful in other domains of self-improvement, to study R/S goals. Data from 350 adults ( = 40.

Emotional Well-being During the First Four Months of COVID-19 in the United States.

Relative to younger adults, older adults have demonstrated higher emotional well-being in the face of the threats of COVID-19 (e.g., Bruine de Bruin in J Gerontol 10.

The Influence of Source and Type of Support on College Students' Physical Activity Behavior.

Background: College is a place where students develop health behaviors that persist throughout adulthood, yet a large percentage of students are not engaging in adequate physical activity. Social support is associated with physical activity; however, the effects of source (ie, family and friend) and type (ie, companionship, esteem, and informational) are not fully understood. The current study examined the effects of different sources and types of social support on college students' physical activity behaviors.

Personality, negative social exchanges, and physical health among bereaved adults.

While much research has investigated the association between personality and health, little research has done so using a bereaved sample. Additionally, little research has investigated how personality influences the frequency of negative social exchanges bereaved individuals receive. This study utilized a structural equation model to investigate the associations among age, gender, personality, negative social exchanges, length of bereavement, and self-reported physical health in a sample of bereaved adults.

The influence of sexual attitudes on mid- to late-life sexual well-being: age, not gender, as a salient factor.

The influence of sexual attitudes on sexual activity and expression has been relatively understudied in older populations. In the current study, we sought to understand the role sexual attitudes have on sexual well-being among middle-aged and young-old adults. Using a diverse sample of participants over the age of 45 (N = 384), a path model was analyzed to determine whether sexual attitudes contributed to sexual well-being.

The influence of sexual attitudes on mid- to late-life sexual well-being: age, not gender, as a salient factor.

The influence of sexual attitudes on sexual activity and expression has been relatively understudied in older populations. In the current study, we sought to understand the role sexual attitudes have on sexual well-being among middle-aged and young-old adults. Using a diverse sample of participants over the age of 45 (N = 384), a path model was analyzed to determine whether sexual attitudes contributed to sexual well-being.

Religiousness, religious doubt, and death anxiety.

Terror Management Theory (TMT) (Greenberg, Pyszczynski, & Solomon, 1986) suggests that culturally-provided worldviews (e.g., religion) may protect individuals from experiencing death anxiety, and several studies have supported this position.

Decision making processes and outcomes.

The primary aim of this study was to examine the contributions of individual characteristics and strategic processing to the prediction of decision quality. Data were provided by 176 adults, ages 18 to 93 years, who completed computerized decision-making vignettes and a battery of demographic and cognitive measures. We examined the relations among age, domain-specific experience, working memory, and three measures of strategic information search to the prediction of solution quality using a 4-step hierarchical linear regression analysis.

Dyadic analysis of self-efficacy and perceived support: the relationship of individual and spousal characteristics with physical activity among middle-aged and young-older adults.

The purpose of this study was to examine the associations among self-efficacy, perceived support, and physical activity in middle-aged and older married couples. A total of 116 middle-aged and older couples (M = 58.86 years, SD = 7.

Disordered eating and psychological distress among adults.

The majority of our knowledge about eating disorders derives from adolescent and young adult samples; knowledge regarding disordered eating in middle and later adulthood is limited. We examined the associations among known predictors of eating disorders for younger adults in an age-diverse sample and within the context of psychological distress. Using data from 567 adults (ages 18 to 88 years), we tested a path model in which age, gender, eating-related cognitions, and satisfaction with appearance predicted eating disorders which, in turn, predicted psychological distress.

Adults' future time perspective predicts engagement in physical activity.

Objective: Our aim was to examine how the relations among known predictors of physical activity, such as age, sex, and body mass index, interact with future time perspective (FTP) and perceived functional limitation to explain adults' engagement in physical activity.

Method: Self-report data from 226 adults (range 20-88 years) were collected to examine the hypothesis that a more expansive FTP is associated with engagement in physical activity.

Results: Results indicated a good fit of the data to the model χ(2) (4, N = 226) = 7.

Physical activity in middle-aged and young-old adults: the roles of self-efficacy, barriers, outcome expectancies, self-regulatory behaviors and social support.

This study tests the associations of self-efficacy, outcome expectancies, perceived barriers, self-regulatory behaviors and social support with physical activity. Data from 116 married community-dwelling middle-aged and young-old couples (M = 58.86 years, SD = 7.