Laura Carstensen: Older People are Happier

In the 20th century we added an unprecedented number of years to our life-spans, but is the quality of life as good? Surprisingly, yes! Psychologist Dr Laura Carstensen shares research that demonstrates that as people get older they become happier, more content, and have a more positive outlook on the world.

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ABOUT

“Dr Laura Carstensen is the founding Director of the Stanford Center on Longevity and a noted expert on socio emotional selectivity theory, a life-span theory of motivation. She is the Fairleigh S. Dickinson Jr. Professor in Public Policy and Professor of Psychology.

For more than twenty years her research has been supported by the National Institute on Aging, and in 2005 she was honoured with a MERIT award from the National Institutes of Health (NIH). With her students and colleagues, she has published more than 100 articles on life-span development.

Her most current empirical research focuses on ways in which motivational changes influence cognitive processing. Dr. Carstensen is a fellow in a number of professional organisations including the Association for Psychological Science, the American Psychological Association and the Gerontological Society of America.

She is the recipient of numerous professional awards and honours and has been selected as a Guggenheim Fellow, she received the Richard Kalish Award for Innovative Research and the Distinguished Career Award from the Gerontological Society of America, as well as Stanford University’s Deans Award for Distinguished Teaching.”

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