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Written By: Agencies | Updated : February 29, 2016 9:57 AM IST
Adults above 60 or senior citizens are far more positive response about feelings such as serenity, sadness and loneliness as compared to young adults, a study has revealed.Rcesearchers from the University of Massachusetts Amherst in the US found that older adults perceive certain emotion terms as most positive and more active than younger individuals. Overall, older people are better equipped to deal with emotions than younger persons.
Older adults report feeling more serenity than younger persons. They also have a richer concept of what it means to feel serene than younger individuals, said lead researcher, Rebecca Ready.This study was published in the journal of Aging and Mental Health, for whicg researchers recruited 32 senior citizens aged between 60 to 92 years old and 111 younger adults aged between 18 to 32 years old. They were then asked to judge 70 emotion terms on whether the words had a positive or negative connotation and if the words were activating or arousing.
In a word grouping task, older adults associated more positive emotional terms with serene, such as cheerful, happy and joyful than did younger people.The findings showed word groupings were similar between older and younger persons for many words but they noted systematic differences especially for feelings of sadness, loneliness, and serenity. Here's how loneliness can affect your health.
We were surprised to find that younger adults associated more self-deprecating terms with feeling sad and lonely, such as being ashamed or disgusted with themselves, than older persons, Ready added.
Through this, researchers gained a far deeper appreciation of some unknown benefits of aging, such as having positive emotions and less shame and embarrassment associated with feeling sad or lonely.The findings could help care-takers, psychotherapists and workers at assisted living facilities to better understand the emotions of older people in their care. Read: Being optimistic can protect your heart.
Source: IANS
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