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Loneliness is a risk factor for older adults, one exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic. Although time spent alone is associated with both loneliness and greater well-being, the experience of solitude may depend on the type of activity pursued. We examined formal prosocial activity as one facilitator of positive solitary experiences. Older adults ( N = 165, Mage = 71.13, SD = 5.70) highly committed to prosocial-program work (e.g., tutoring) filled out surveys at six random times every day for a week. Using multilevel modeling, we investigated whether participating in prosocial-program activity alone was associated with greater well-being compared to other solitary activity. While prosocial-program activity did not buffer against negative affect in solitude, it promoted positive affect and relatedness when alone. To the extent that prosocial-program work can facilitate positive solitary experiences by enhancing feelings of connection, it may protect against threats to well-being posed by loneliness in later life.

This symposium reports findings from a national experience-sampling study of 165 older adults (mean age=71, range=60-88 years) who are heavily involved in prosocial activity, contributing to their communities as leaders or high-commitment volunteers in social-purpose organizations. Gerontological research has linked prosocial activity to a set of positive outcomes for the older adults who engage in it (e.g., better health and reduced mortality), including global measures of well-being such as life satisfaction. However, little is known about the contributors to these individuals’ momentary well-being. Four presentations address this gap in knowledge. In the first presentation, Dwight Tse revisits the concept of successful aging as a within-person variable with day-to-day variations. Experience sampling data revealed great variations in successful aging indicators, and successful aging was associated with better well-being as hypothesized. In the second presentation, Ajit Mann extends beyond general control beliefs and explores the diversity in distribution of control beliefs across various daily activities (e.g., active leisure, prosocial activity, socializing, etc.), in addition to investigating the relationship between later life control diversity and subjective well-being. In the third presentation, Kelsey Finley explores Aristotle’s concept of the golden mean (an ideal state between deficiency and excess) for the number of hours spent in prosocial work on momentary well-being outcomes. In the fourth presentation, Jeanne Nakamura examines the relationship between global meaning in life and meaningful engagement in the moment, illuminating variation in this relationship through a comparison of the prosocial leaders and high-commitment volunteers.

Recent years have seen growing interest in older adults’ sense of meaning in life, a core dimension of eudaimonic well-being throughout adulthood that has been associated in later life with reduced morbidity and mortality. Currently, the relations between this global sense of meaning in life and the experience of meaningful engagement in the moment remain largely unexplored, particularly in later lives that are distinguished by high levels of meaning. Multilevel analysis of ESM data from prosocial leaders and volunteers indicated that feelings of meaningful engagement fluctuated in daily life for both groups, even while questionnaire data showed that global sense of meaning in life was high. Examining basic sources of fulfillment (e.g., sense of relatedness) revealed type of involvement (leadership vs. volunteerism) affected the source(s) of fulfillment that connected meaning at the global and momentary levels. Implications for theory, research, and applied work on meaning and prosocial commitment are discussed.

Contemporary theories consider development to be lifelong, suggesting a potential for personal growth in older adulthood. Narrative studies have found benefits of having growth themes in older adults’ broad life stories, yet there is limited research focusing on the specific experiences in later life that elicit growth. One potential for personal growth during older age is through prosocial behavior, but studies have overlooked how older adults narrate such experiences and the perceived impact the narratives have on the self. We conducted interviews with a sample of 47 older adults engaged in prosocial commitments to examine the types of perceived self-change as well as patterns in high points and low points of the experience. Narrative analyses revealed the majority of participants reported a change in the self, and half of the sample used growth themes to characterize the self-change. Inductive coding of change narratives revealed an emergent category of virtuous change (e.g., transcendence, wisdom, humanity), as well as a variety of other change categories (e.g., competence, cognitive abilities, negative changes). Those who grew narrated high points and low points with more integration than those who did not, displaying a multifaceted, complex understanding of significant episodes through a blend of both positive and negative elements within one story. These findings suggest that an integrated understanding of prosocial experiences may provide an avenue toward personal growth. Implications for research and practice are discussed.

Recent advancements in research on control beliefs have enabled the assessment of inter-individual differences in its intra-individual variability via a measure of control diversity. However, past research has focused on control diversity in relation to daily stressors. Among a sample of prosocial exemplars, this experience sampling study investigates control diversity across general daily activities and explores its relationship with subjective well-being. Participants indicated the activity they were primarily involved in, the extent to which they felt in control over the situation, and levels of positive and negative affect each time they were signaled; satisfaction with life was measured using a one-time survey at the end of the study. Results from multilevel structural equation modeling suggested that control diversity did not significantly predict positive or negative affect, or satisfaction with life. The study points toward the lack of association between control diversity and subjective well-being and highlights future directions for research.

The role of purpose in the lives of older adults is a topic of increasing interest to the community of gerontologists, psychologists, and practitioners seeking a better understanding of how older adults can contribute to the greater good of society. “Purpose” has been variously associated with well-being, including physical and mental health, preventing social isolation, working longer, and the concept of productive aging. New research is deepening our understand of purpose in the 50+ population and providing new ways of looking at the relationship between these frameworks, how they intersect (or don’t), and how we can develop models for advancing purpose as a “good” in the lives of older adults and as a force for change in society. Jim Emerman will report on research from a three-year study conducted by researchers at Stanford University and Encore.org on the prevalence and characteristics of purpose beyond-the-self. Jeanne Nakamura will report on new research on the role of purpose in the day-to-day lives of older volunteers and social innovators. Philip Taylor will discuss finding meaning and identity outside the workplace and challenging productivity notions of later life.

As one form of productive aging, many older adults undertake significant prosocial activity. Alongside its contribution to the welfare of others, prosocial activity has been linked to a variety of positive outcomes for those undertaking it (e.g., higher life satisfaction). However, little is known about the impact of this activity on older adults’ day-to-day lives. We studied a national sample of about 150 older adults who give back to their communities on a regular basis in one of two ways: either by playing leadership roles in social-purpose organizations or as more traditional volunteer workers in such organizations. We employed the experience sampling method to describe and compare the experience of prosocial activity during a typical week for these two groups of highly engaged adults. While prosocial activity carries both costs and rewards, these show differences as well as similarities for the two groups. Implications for research and practice are discussed.

Much attention has been devoted to traditional forms of social contribution in later life such as volunteering. In contrast, little is known about social innovation – the creation of new ways to address persistent social problems. In particular, the pathways leading to social innovation in later life are largely uncharted. In an ongoing mixed-methods research project, we are examining the nature, antecedents, and correlates of this form of social contribution in later life by studying nominees for the Purpose Prize, a U.S. award that recognizes successful social innovation by individuals over sixty. This presentation will draw on semi-structured interviews conducted with 50 Purpose Prize honorees. Based on systematic coding and analysis, we present the key building blocks of older adults’ pathways to social innovation, and distill the features of the most common pathways while documenting the diversity of pathways taken. Implications for facilitating later-life expression of creative prosocial energies are discussed.

Flow theory postulates that people enjoy the optimal experience when challenge level of an activity matches their skill level. However, little research has extended the theory to examine the effect of challenge-skill balance on older adults’ emotional experiences. This recently completed study investigated whether older adults experienced more frequent high arousal positive(HAP) and low arousal positive(LAP) emotions in challenge-skill balanced activities. 104 younger(Mage=25.8, SD=2.76) and 93 older adults(Mage=65.0, SD=4.78) identified underchallenging(challenge-lower-than-skill), challenge-skill balanced, and overchallenging(challenge-higher-than-skill) activities that they had chosen to do in the past, and reported their typical emotions in each activity. Results were analyzed by repeated measures ANOVA and paired comparison t-tests. Consistent with flow theory, both younger and older adults reported more frequent HAP and LAP emotions in challenge-skill balanced activities than in underchallenging or overchallenging activities, F(2,392)=133.42, p

Social contribution is a source of meaning and purpose, viewed as closely related but distinct aspects of flourishing. In later life, one investment of accumulated experience and available time is a dedication to social contribution. We report on an experience sampling study of meaningfulness and purpose in the daily lives of 52 nominees for the Purpose Prize, a U.S. award recognizing social contribution after age sixty. Consistent with expected overlap between experiencing meaning and enacting purpose, average levels of the two were nearly identical. They also were moderately correlated. Further, social contribution was associated with both: participants reported experiencing more meaningfulness and more purpose (p’s

One step toward the actualization of successful aging in society is to unveil the lives of older adults who are thriving and flourishing. Specifically, the knowledge of the daily lives of civic engagement exemplars may shed light on how to live well and make day-to-day contributions to society. This symposium intends to provide researchers and practitioners with insight into the momentary experiences of civic engagement exemplars and recommendations on conducting experience sampling research with both exemplary and normative older populations. The symposium reports on an experience sampling study with nominees for the Purpose Prize, a national award in the U.S. that honors successful efforts to tackle difficult social problems after the age of 60. Participants filled out short surveys in response to six random signals per day for seven days. The 52 exemplars (age range=64–84) together completed 1617 momentary reports, with 40% of reports capturing the work on their social programs. The first presentation (Finley et al.) reports that the exemplars scored higher on all momentary indicators of successful aging when engaged in social contribution compared to when they were doing something else. The second presentation (Boeder et al.) highlights the contribution of solitary civic engagement activities to the exemplars’ perceived social connectedness. The third presentation (Nakamura et al.) discusses methodological considerations related to the study of older (exemplar) population’s momentary experiences. Finally, James Emerman as the discussant concludes the symposium with the applied implications of the presentations.

This presentation discusses methodological strengths and limitations of using experience sampling methods (ESM) with an older exemplar population. As illustrated in the preceding papers and in this presentation, ESM provided rich information about the dynamics of civic engagement exemplars’ experience and the ecology of their daily lives impossible to obtain with other methods. This study was conducted despite a number of apparent barriers. For example, the sample of civic engagement exemplars was dispersed across the country, precluding person-to-person walkthroughs. In addition, although technological advances enable ESM researchers to utilize increasingly sophisticated technology for data collection, there were also concerns as to whether the participant experience would be hindered by introducing novel technology to the sample. Lessons of general interest gleaned from both researchers and participants will be discussed and methods of addressing these issues will be described.

Across the life course, dedication to a social purpose is associated with both individual and collective well-being. Increasingly, later life is being recognized as a period when adults may form a purpose goal meaningful to themselves and useful to others and dedicate their energies to pursuing it, for example, by leveraging accrued experience to create new ways of addressing social problems. Three papers will share empirical reports addressing how older adults in the U.S. form and pursue social purpose and the psychosocial and institutional means by which this can be facilitated, summarizing lessons learned from three mixed-methods research projects. A leader in the psychology of aging will provide a discussion. Anne Colby will present results of a study of purpose beyond-the-self and its correlates in adults over 50, based on a survey of a nationally representative sample (n=1,200) and over 100 interviews on the topic. Jeanne Nakamura will present a paper based on 50 in-depth interviews with individuals over 60 who have been honored for successful social innovation, charting the diverse pathways those individuals took to realize their purpose goals. Jim Emerman will discuss results of a survey of organizations helping older individuals find ways to live out their purpose goals, mapping programmatic resources available to this population and analyzing opportunities and gaps in services. Then, Laura Carstensen will provide an integrative discussion of the papers, informed by her extensive body of work. The session will conclude with discussion by the panel and audience of issues that have been raised.