Social policy measures for improving subjective well-being in later life: Issues of theoretical and empirical foundation

Subjective well-being (SWB) in later life is important not just as an indicator of life quality, of mental health and of successful aging of older people, but also because of its effects on individually or socially relevant outcomes (e.g. health, social engagement). This raises the question about the extent to which and under what conditions SWB of older people can be improved by social policy measures (SPM). Our presentation examines theoretical and empirical issues related to answering this question. A first theoretical topic considers the relevance of bottom-up vs. top-down approaches conceptualizing the link between domain-specific satisfaction (e.g., with health, financial situation, social relationships) and global life satisfaction in old age. A second issue concerns the theoretical status of SWB in causal networks, i.e., SWB as consequence, as cause, as mediator and as moderator variable. A third topic refers to what can be derived from different theoretical approaches to SWB about whether and when SPM should have an effect of SWB in later life. Following that several empirical questions with respect to improving SWB of older people through SPM are considered.
First, we discuss whether the present level of SWB in older adults (or subgroups thereof) indicates a demand for improving SWB. Second, we look at the importance of SWB for individually and socially desirable outcomes (e.g., on health, community involvement) by providing specific evidence which can provide further reasons for improving SWB through SPM. Third, we examine which life circumstances (e.g., financial situation, functional status), life events (e.g., becoming disabled) and individual activities (e.g., volunteering) are known to be significantly related to SWB and which of these conditions could principally be improved through SPM. Fourth, we discuss existing and needed empirical evidence for the effects of local, regional, national SPM on SWB in later life. We emphasize that past research has already produced an impressive body of knowledge relevant for improving SWB in older people through SPM, but that further theoretical and empirical efforts are needed to provide such SPM with a richer foundation. We conclude that better strategies for communicating results of research about SWB to policy makers should be elaborated so that these can have more impact on policy decisions about SPM.