@article {9010, title = {Widowhood and Depression in a Cross-National Perspective: Evidence from the United States, Europe, Korea, and China.}, journal = {The Journals of Gerontology: Series B}, volume = {73}, year = {2019}, pages = {e143-e153}, abstract = {

Objectives: We explore marital and depression trajectories over time for men and women, and distinguish between mood and somatic depression across contexts.

Method: We use longitudinal data from 2002 to 2013 from the United States, England, Europe, Korea, and China to explore depression among individuals married at baseline and follow their trajectories into widowhood with married as the reference group. We use random effects models to estimate these trajectories using the Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale (CES-D) or EURO-D scales for men and women.

Results: Depression peaks within the first year of widowhood for men and women, but women recover to levels comparable to married counterparts in all countries. Men sustain high levels of depression even 6-10 years post-widowhood everywhere except Europe. Widowed women have higher somatic depression compared to men, who have higher mood depression. Family plays differential roles in mediating depression across countries.

Discussion: Our research shows the complex global relationship between widowhood and depression. Studies that do not compare depression trajectories over time may make incorrect inferences about the persistence of depression by gender and country. Interventions should target different components of depression: mood-related symptoms for men and somatic-related symptoms for women for most effective recovery.

}, keywords = {Bereavement, CHARLS, Cross-National, Depressive symptoms, ELSA, KLoSA, SHARE}, issn = {1758-5368}, doi = {10.1093/geronb/gbx021}, author = {Jadhav, Apoorva and David R Weir} } @article {9038, title = {Who does well in life? Conscientious adults excel in both objective and subjective success.}, journal = {Frontiers in Psychology}, volume = {3}, year = {2012}, month = {2012}, pages = {356}, abstract = {This article investigates how personality and cognitive ability relate to measures of objective success (income and wealth) and subjective success (life satisfaction, positive affect, and lack of negative affect) in a representative sample of 9,646 American adults. In cross-sectional analyses controlling for demographic covariates, cognitive ability, and other Big Five traits, conscientiousness demonstrated beneficial associations of small-to-medium magnitude with all success outcomes. In contrast, other traits demonstrated stronger, but less consistently beneficial, relations with outcomes in the same models. For instance, emotional stability demonstrated medium-to-large associations with life satisfaction and affect but a weak association with income and no association with wealth. Likewise, extraversion demonstrated medium-to-large associations with positive affect and life satisfaction but small-to-medium associations with wealth and (lack of) negative affect and no association with income. Cognitive ability showed small-to-medium associations with income and wealth but no association with any aspect of subjective success. More agreeable adults were worse off in terms of objective success and life satisfaction, demonstrating small-to-medium inverse associations with those outcomes, but they did not differ from less agreeable adults in positive or negative affect. Likewise, openness to experience demonstrated small-to-medium inverse associations with every success outcome except positive affect, in which more open adults were slightly higher. Notably, in each of the five models predicting objective and subjective success outcomes, individual differences other than conscientiousness explained more variance than did conscientiousness. Thus, the benefits of conscientiousness may be remarkable more for their ubiquity than for their magnitude.}, keywords = {Conscientiousness, Success}, issn = {1664-1078}, doi = {10.3389/fpsyg.2012.00356}, author = {Angela Lee Duckworth and David R Weir and Tsukayama, Eli and Kwok, David} } @article {5496, title = {Widowhood, Divorce and Loss of Health Insurance Among Near-Elderly Women: Evidence from the Health and Retirement Study}, number = {WP2003-040}, year = {2003}, institution = {Michigan Retirement Research Center, University of Michigan}, address = {Ann Arbor, MI}, abstract = {We have found modest effects of widowhood events on loss of health insurance. There are also modest effects of widowhood on labor supply, which we have not as yet attempted to attribute to insurance demand. Even new widowhood events, however, are not random with respect to initial conditions. Both initial health insurance status and risk of future widowhood are related to basic characteristics observed when married at baseline. When these confounding variables are controlled for in models of the effect of widowhood events on uninsurance, there is no longer statistical evidence of an independent effect of husband{\textquoteright}s death on risk of losing insurance. Part of the reason why the measured independent effect of widowhood appears small is that there are events within marriage that can also affect insurance coverage, such as retirement or health events. Even though the number of uninsured women whose lack of coverage can be attributed to widowhood is therefore small, and not a distinct major policy motive for changes in age of eligibility for Medicare, uninsurance rates overall among the near elderly, and the potential public burden of cost-shifting from years just before 65 to years just after gaining Medicare coverage, suggest that Medicare eligibility policies should be a focus of continued research.}, keywords = {Adult children, Demographics, Medicare/Medicaid/Health Insurance, Net Worth and Assets, Women and Minorities}, url = {https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1090894}, author = {David R Weir and Robert J. Willis} }