The coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic might have affected older adults' personal and general views on aging (VoA) because they were frequently, particularly during the early phase of the pandemic, portrayed as a homogeneous, vulnerable group in the media and in public debates. Also, their higher risk of severe COVID-19 disease progression as well as other pandemic-related stressors and restrictions might have impacted how older adults perceive their own aging. In this study, it was examined to which extent middle-aged and older adults' personal and general VoA changed due to the pandemic by distinguishing between normative age-graded change across multiple measurement occasions and potentially pandemic-specific history-graded change. Multiple VoA indicators (personal VoA: attitude toward own aging, subjective age, awareness of age-related change [gains and losses]; general VoA: domain-specific age stereotypes) of 423 German adults aged 40 years and older were assessed across three prepandemic measurement occasions (2012, 2015, and 2017) and one occasion after the pandemic's outbreak (summer 2020). Normative age-graded changes and pandemic-specific changes were estimated and compared using longitudinal multilevel regression analyses. Both perceived age-related gains and age-related losses decreased between 2012 and 2017, but increased thereafter between 2017 and 2020. Further, the overall change trend toward less positive attitude toward own aging slowed down from 2017 to 2020. There was also a slight trend toward younger subjective ages from 2017 to 2020. For most age stereotypes, pandemic-specific trends indicated a shift toward more negative stereotypes. These findings suggest that pandemic-specific changes in VoA are multidirectional, comprising perceptions of both losses and gains. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).

中文翻译：

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COVID-19 大流行是否影响了老年人对衰老的个人和普遍看法？损失和收益的证据。


冠状病毒病（COVID-19）大流行可能影响了老年人对老龄化的个人和普遍看法（VoA），因为他们经常被媒体和社会描述为同质的弱势群体，特别是在大流行的早期阶段。公开辩论。此外，他们患严重 COVID-19 疾病进展的风险较高，以及其他与大流行相关的压力源和限制可能会影响老年人对自己衰老的看法。在这项研究中，通过区分多个测量场合的规范年龄分级变化和潜在的大流行特定历史分级变化，研究了中老年人的个人和总体 VoA 在多大程度上因大流行而发生了变化。对 423 名 40 岁及以上德国成年人的多项 VoA 指标（个人 VoA：对自身衰老的态度、主观年龄、对与年龄相关的变化的认识[得失]；一般 VoA：特定领域的年龄刻板印象）进行了评估，涵盖三个大流行前阶段测量一次（2012年、2015年和2017年）以及大流行爆发后一次（2020年夏季）。使用纵向多级回归分析来估计和比较规范的年龄分级变化和大流行特定的变化。 2012 年至 2017 年间，感知到的与年龄相关的获益和与年龄相关的损失均有所下降，但此后在 2017 年至 2020 年期间有所增加。此外，从 2017 年至 2020 年，对自身衰老态度不太积极的总体变化趋势有所放缓。从 2017 年到 2020 年，主观年龄有趋向年轻化的趋势。对于大多数年龄刻板印象，特定于大流行的趋势表明，人们的刻板印象正在转向更加负面的刻板印象。 这些发现表明，VoA 中针对大流行的特定变化是多向的，包括对损失和收益的看法。 （PsycInfo 数据库记录 (c) 2022 APA，保留所有权利）。