Objectives: This study aims to offer a wider view on the role of coping strategies on elderly’s well-being by means of literature-based competitive structural equation models (SEMs). Methods: 857 older adults were surveyed. Measures included Ryff’s scales of Psychological Well-being and the Coping Strategies Questionnaire. Competitive SEMs were tested. Results: In the retained model, the religious coping dimension was removed, and the remaining dimensions were defined by problem- and emotion-focused coping, which explained both psychological and subjective well-being factors (χ²(46) = 165.910, p < 0.001; CFI = 0.906; GFI = 0.957; RMSEA = 0.058 [0.048,0.067]). Discussion: Results pointed to the relevance of coping strategies for achieving adequate well-being, with emotion-focused coping strategies being the ones with negative and highest predictive power over the two dimensions of well-being. Interventions aiming at improving old people’s well-being should, put their focus on decreasing the use of emotion-coping strategies.

CASP-12 (Control, Autonomy, Self-realization, and Pleasure scale) is one of the most common internationally used measures for quality of life in older adults, although its structure is not clearly established. Current research aims to test the factor structure of the CASP-12, so as to provide evidence on reliability and external validity, and to test for measurement invariance across age groups. Data from 61,355 Europeans (≥60 years old) from the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe wave 7 were used. CASP-12, EURO-D (European depression scale), self-perceived health, and life satisfaction measurements were included. Reliability and validity coefficients, competing confirmatory factor models, and standard measurement invariance routine were estimated. A second-order factor model with the original factor structure was retained. The scale showed adequate reliability coefficients except for the autonomy dimension. The correlation coefficients for external validity were all statistically significant. Finally, CASP-12 is scalar invariant across age. We conclude that the best-fitting factor structure retained allows using CASP-12 either by factors, or as an overall score, depending on the research interests. Findings related to CASP-12 measurement invariance encourage its use in the oldest-old too. When comparing the dimensions across age groups, as people age, autonomy slightly increases and the rest of the dimensions decline.

A challenge of the ageing of the population is cognitive performance, given its association to optimal ageing. Documented predictors of cognition have included socio-demographics, education or physical factors. However, the association of social and intellectual activity participation to cognition has been less studied. This study presents a predictive model of cognitive functioning including these alternative factors as well as more seminal ones to explain cognition in old age. The sample was composed by 45475 older adult participants in the 8th Wave of the Survey of Health, Aging and Retirement in Europe, that took place between 2019 and 2020. A correlational design was specified to test the effects of age, gender, years of education, physical inactivity, number of chronic diseases, social activity participation and intellectual activity participation on temporal orientation, numeracy, verbal fluency and memory. A completely a priori Structural Equation Model with latent variables was tested. The sample had an average of 70 years of age, was well-educated and physically active and engaged in reading. There was a higher proportion of females. The model showed an optimal fit to the data, explaining 8.7%-36.0% of the different cognitive components' variance. Age, years of education and intellectual activity displayed the largest effects across the cognitive domains. Findings suggest that social and intellectual activity participation are of relative importance to predict cognition in old age, even when considering other well-documented factors affecting older adults' cognitive functioning.

The EURO-D is a short scale to measure symptoms of depression, very used in large population surveys. Although there are numerous validation studies, its psychometric properties remain unclear. The two-factor structure (Affective Suffering and Lack of Motivation) is replicated in several studies but with different item compositions, and none reported reliability indices for both factors. For that reason, the aim of this study is to examine the factorial validity of the scale, the reliability of the dimensions, the gender differential item functioning (DIF), and the nomological validity. 46,317 participants aged 50 and over (M = 71.33), from which 57.4 % were females, in Wave 8 of the Survey of Health, Aging and Retirement in Europe (SHARE) were included. EURO-D, R-UCLA, Self-perceived health index, and indicator of taking drugs for anxiety or depression. Factor Analyses, DIF, Reliability Index and Spearman correlations were estimated. Factor analysis identified a bifactor structure: a general factor of Depression and two specific factors of Affective Suffering and Lack of Motivation, which reliabilities were 0.83, 0.83 and 0.79 respectively. No relevant DIF item by gender was found, but higher scores were found in women in all factors. Both factors had positive relations with loneliness, taking drugs and self-perceived health. this study has a cross-sectional design; future research may consider the longitudinal stability of the scale. EURO-D shows adequate psychometric properties when a general factor of depression and two specific factors are considered. Women have higher scores on all dimensions.

This study analyzes the dimensionality, reliability, metric invariance, and convergent validity of the Schoolwork Engagement Inventory (SEI) in secondary education. Participants in the study were 679 students in compulsory and post-compulsory secondary education in a large city in Eastern Spain during the 2014-2015 academic year. Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) showed that the one-factor model of the SEI is superior to the other alternative models considered, providing an overall schoolwork engagement score in this educational stage. Reliability was also adequate and the instrument was found to be invariant by gender and educational level. Latent mean comparisons revealed a significant decline in schoolwork engagement throughout secondary compulsory education, and returning to higher levels in post-compulsory secondary education. A CFA also showed SEI’s convergent validity with self-regulated learning, given its direct relationship with metacognitive strategies and self-efficacy for learning, and its inverse relationship with test anxiety.

Objectives:We aimed to explore the reciprocal effects of social participation, loneliness, and physical inactivity over a period of 6 years in a representative sample of European adults over 50 years old.Design:A longitudinal study with a six-year follow-up period was conducted.Setting:Four waves of the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe project were used.Participants:This study includes 64,887 participants from Europe and Israel, who were aged 50 or older at the first time.Measurements:The relationship between participation in social activities, loneliness and physical inactivity was analyzed, controlling for age, gender, and disability. A series of cross-lagged panel models (CLPMs) were applied to analyze the relationships among these variables.Results:A CLPM with equal autoregressive cross-lagged effects across waves was the best fit to the data (χ2 = 7137.8, CFI = .972, RMSEA = .049, SRMR = .036). The autoregressive effects for the three variables showed high stability across waves, and all the cross-lagged effects in the model were statistically significant. Social activity and physical inactivity maintained a strong negative cross-lagged effect, while their cross-lagged effects on loneliness were comparatively smaller. Social activity had a positive cross-lagged effect on loneliness, while physical inactivity had a negative cross-lagged effect on loneliness.Conclusions:These findings highlight the importance of promoting physical activity and social participation and addressing loneliness through targeted interventions in older adults.