Journals of Gerontology Series B: Psychological Sciences and Social Sciences, Vol 51, Issue 4 S217-S220, Copyright © 1996 by The Gerontological Society of America
Age and the sense of control among older adults
FD Wolinsky and TE Stump
School of Public Health, Saint Louis University Health Sciences Center, MO 63108-3342, USA. wolinsky@wpogate.sluvca.slu.edu
Older adults are expected and frequently found to report less control than
younger adults. In this study, we decompose this negative relationship
between age and sense of control using nested multivariable linear
regression models that serially introduce sociodemographic characteristics,
socioeconomic factors, health status, and subjective religiosity and
religious beliefs in a sample of 1,051 older adults attending the general
medicine clinics of a major medical center. The results indicate that the
effect of age is suppressed in the bivariable model. In the final
multivariable model, educational attainment has the largest relative effect
(i.e., beta; .253), followed by age (-.210), mental health (.174),
subjective religiosity (.113), being an African American (-.100), perceived
health (.082), and being Catholic (.068). Future research should focus on
the inflection point in the relationship between age and the sense of
control that apparently occurs at about 50 years of age.
