Activity Diversity and Well-Being in Daily Life: Evidence for Heterogeneity Between Older Adults.

Objectives: Although higher activity diversity is associated with higher well-being at the between-person level, it is unknown whether a day with higher activity diversity is related to higher well-being within persons. Within 24 hr per day, there are a limited number of activities on which individuals could spend their time and energy. Personal resources could influence the expenditure of energy and thus the experience with daily activities.

The Mediating Role of Affective States in Short-Term Effects of Activity Engagement on Working Memory in Older Age.

Introduction: It has been shown that activity engagement is associated with cognitive ability in older age, but mechanisms behind the associations have rarely been examined. Following a recent study which showed short-term effects of activity engagement on working memory performance appearing 6 h later, this study examined the mediating role of affective states in this process.

Methods: For 7 times per day over 2 weeks, 150 Swiss older adults (aged 65-91 years) reported their present (sociocognitive/passive leisure) activities and affective states (high-arousal positive, low-arousal positive, high-arousal negative, and low-arousal negative) and completed an ambulatory working memory task on a smartphone.

The short-term effects of activity engagement on working memory performance in older age.

Does a single bout of activity engagement have short-term effects on cognition in daily life? Using a smartphone-based ambulatory assessment design, this study examined the duration of the effects of three types of activities (i.e., sociocognitive, passive leisure, and physical activities) on working memory performance.

Daily activity diversity and daily working memory in community-dwelling older adults.

Objective: Cross-sectional and long-term longitudinal studies have shown that engagement in diverse activities benefits cognitive performance in older age, but it is unknown whether the beneficial effect holds within persons on a daily basis. This study examines the within-person association between activity diversity and working memory on the same day and its time-lagged directionality between days. It also examines the effects of potential moderators on the within-person association, including age, education, processing speed, and crystallized intelligence, to understand who may benefit more from daily activity diversity.