Forecasting Life Satisfaction Across Adulthood: Benefits of Seeing a Dark Future?

We used the overlapping ratings of future life satisfaction in 5 years and current life satisfaction to calculate the accuracy in predicting future life satisfaction as the difference between ratings of future life satisfaction in 5 years (e.g., obtained in 1993) and of current life satisfaction 5 years later (e.g., obtained in 1998). [...] In a second step, we proceeded in an analogous fashion and fit a growth curve model for our indicator of the accuracy in predicting future life satisfaction (i.e., the difference between future life satisfaction in 5 years and current life satisfaction 5 years later; 6 yearly occasions). [...] Longitudinal Changes in Future Life Satisfaction and Current Life Satisfaction In a first step, we explored whether and how ratings of future life satisfaction in 5 years and current life satisfaction changed over time and evinced an age-differential pattern. [...] FORECASTING LIFE SATISFACTION 22 Accuracy of Predicting Future Life Satisfaction: Implications and Outcomes In a fourth and final step, we investigated whether or not the underestimation of future life satisfaction was predictive of key outcomes of successful aging, namely, the 11- year risk ratio for disability incidence and the 12-year risk ratio for mortality. [...] Health Benefits of Foreseeing a Dark Future in Old Age In the unique data set of the SOEP, we were able to relate our findings on the stability, robustness, and accuracy of anticipated future life satisfaction to healthy aging outcomes of functional disability and mortality.