ScienceDaily: Social interactions tied to sense of purpose

“Having positive social interactions is associated with older adults' sense of purposefulness, which can fluctuate from day to day, according to research from the Department of Psychological & Brain Sciences in Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis.

And although these findings, published in the July 2022 issue of the American Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry, apply to both working and retired adults, the research found that for better and for worse these interactions are more strongly correlated to purposefulness in people who are retired.

"Specifically for our retired older adults, this is a construct we should really care about," said Gabrielle Pfund, who led the study as a PhD student in the lab of Patrick Hill, associate professor of psychological and brain sciences. Pfund graduated in June and is now at Northwestern University.

The research team worked with a group of some 100 adults with an average age of about 71. For 15 days, participants were asked three times daily about the quality of the social interactions they'd had that day. Every evening they were asked to use a scale of one to five to answer the question: How much do you think your life had a purpose today?

After analyzing the responses, they found -- relative to each person's own baseline -- the more positive interactions a person had during the day, the more purposeful they reported feeling in the evening. Other measures, including employment and relationship status, did not predict a person's sense of purpose.”

Some Insights From This Article

• Our sense of purpose and belonging in this world is tied to meaningful relationships and social interactions we have with each other. As we grow older we become increasingly more aware of the value of relationships more so than anything else as our health slowly but surely becomes suboptimal, our youthfulness gone and running out of things money can buy.

• Even for me I feel as if the more positive social interactions I experience throughout the day the more satisfied I am at the end of the day.

• It’s important to note that these are instances of positive social interactions and do not apply to any interactions. Negative interactions or forcing ourselves to the point of social burn-out are common precautions to be aware of.

What is your definition of a positive social interaction?

Full article is here!

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