Older adults’ recalled memorable messages about aging and their role in the communicative ecology model of successful aging
- 12 January 2022
- journal article
- research article
- Published by Taylor & Francis in Communication Quarterly
- Vol. 70 (2) , 132-160
Abstract
This study examined how older adults’ dispositional hope was associated with the themes of up to three recalled memorable messages about aging, as well as how older adults’ own age-related communication and memorable message themes were indirectly associated with successful aging, via aging efficacy. Dispositional hope was positively associated with the recollection of memorable messages with a theme of aging is not important or aging is a subjective state that can be overcome with the right mind-set. Relative to engaged agers, bantering agers and gloomy agers reported less successful aging, via less aging efficacy. The memorable message themes were not indirectly associated with successful aging, via aging efficacy. The results suggest that people may have some agency in how well they age, and the results also inform conceptual and methodological issues in memorable messages scholarship.Keywords
This publication has 42 references indexed in Scilit:
- Memorable Messages of Hard Times: Constructing Short- and Long-Term Resiliencies Through Family CommunicationJournal of Family Communication, 2012
- “If You Can Dream It, You Can Achieve It.” Parent Memorable Messages as Indicators of College Student SuccessCommunication Education, 2011
- Successful Aging: Early Influences and Contemporary CharacteristicsThe Gerontologist, 2010
- Hope and Goal Attainment: Testing a Basic Prediction of Hope TheoryJournal of Social and Clinical Psychology, 2009
- Distinguishing Hope and Optimism: Two Sides of a Coin, or Two Separate Coins?Journal of Social and Clinical Psychology, 2004
- “Have Fun While You Can,”“You're Only as Old as You Feel,” and “Don't Ever Get Old!”: An Examination of Memorable Messages about AgingJournal of Communication, 2002
- Human affection exchange: V. Attributes of the highly affectionateCommunication Quarterly, 2002
- The hope construct, will, and ways: Their relations with self-efficacy, optimism, and general well-beingJournal of Clinical Psychology, 1999
- The role of memorable messages in the process of organizational socializationCommunication Quarterly, 1986
- A Theory of Social Comparison ProcessesHuman Relations, 1954