COMPARISON PROCESSES AND LIFE SATISFACTIO N WITH AGE - RESULTS OF A PILOT-STUDY

Based on the controversy as to whether social or temporal comparisons are important with regard to life satisfaction in elderly people, a pi lot study was conducted. A total of 42 elderly women had to rate thems elves along various dimensions and it was examined how often self-rati ngs had been based on comparison information as inferred from comments on these ratings. Despite this free response measure, subjects had to rate how often they engaged in various types of comparisons (upward, downward, temporal, social) in their daily lives. Results show that co mparison information is almost never referred to in spontaneous commen ts on self-assessments. On the other hand, some types of comparisons a re reported to be made rather frequently in daily life. In addition, f requency of temporal (upward) comparisons proved to be significantly r elated to a measure of life satisfaction which is taken as a first hin t to the detrimental role of temporal comparisons with regard to life satisfaction in old age.