Ella Cohn-Schwartz

Subjective views of aging often change in a myriad of different ways across life, yet we are only beginning to understand pivotal questions around the how, when, and why of such transitions. The objective of the current chapter is to provide a systematic overview of conceptual perspectives and empirical research about the ways in which subjective views of aging change along time metrics that evolve more slowly (macro-time scales) and those that evolve more rapidly (micro-time scales). To do so, we start with reviewing insights gained from research examining age-related changes. In a second step, we discuss how subjective views of aging change as people approach death and then broaden the perspective by considering time-to/from-events metrics more generally, including how subjective views of aging may change as people move into and adapt to major life transitions such as disability and widowhood. In a third step, we discuss possible ways in which subjective views of aging may change over micro-time scales from one moment, one day, or one week to the next as people go about their everyday lives. In a final step, we consider how subjective views of aging may be intertwined between long-term partners and other confidants such as intergenerational pairs. We also discuss how integrated multi-time-metric designs that track both macro- and micro developmental dynamics will help us better understand key questions of temporal ordering, lead-lag dynamics, and mechanisms underlying stability and change in subjective views of aging and their predictive effects for key developmental outcomes.