Sunny Seniors Can Bounce Back From Poor Well-Being

Key TakeawaysOlder people can recover from poor well-beingNearly a quarter of people 60 or older bounced back from lower well-being within three yearsThose with good psychological and emotional health were five times more likely to recuperate.THURSDAY, Sept. 25, 2025 (HealthDay News) — The march of time may be relentless, but aging is not entirely hopeless if you have the right mindset, according to a Canadian study.Seniors who lose a step health-wise are capable of regaining their well-being, researchers reported Sept. 24 in the journal PLOS One.Nearly a quarter of folks 60 or older who initially reported poor well-being had regained their optimal level within three years, results showed.Those with strong levels of psychological and emotional wellness were nearly five times more likely to regain optimal well-being, researchers found.“What’s powerful about this research is the reminder that later life can still be fulfilling, even after difficult periods,” said lead researcher Mabel Ho, a recent doctoral graduate of the University of Toronto’s Factor-Inwentash Faculty of Social Work and the Institute of Life Course and Aging.“Good health is important, but so are the people, meaning, and joy we have in our lives,” she added in a news release.For the new paper, researchers tracked the health of more than 8,300 older adults participating in the Canadian Longitudinal Study on Aging. All of these folks did not have optimal well-being at the start, suffering either from physical health problems, psychological or emotional issues, social isolation or a poor outlook on their own aging, researchers said.The team then checked back in on them after three years, to see how well they’d fared in the intervening time.Results showed that 23% of the people had gotten back to optimal well-being by the time of the check-in.People were most likely to regain their health if they were younger than 70 at the outset, had an income over the poverty line, were married or widowed, were non-smokers, remained physically active, got good sleep and didn’t have chronic health problems like obesity, diabetes, arthritis or osteoporosis, researchers found.“This is a clear call to invest in prevention, financial stability, and accessible wellness supports — because these aren’t just smart policies, they can potentially improve the trajectory of aging for older adults who are struggling," senior researcher Esme Fuller-Thomson said in a news release. She’s director of the Institute for Life Course & Aging.Psychological and emotional wellness appeared to be the most powerful factor in terms of regaining overall well-being, researchers found.“Respondents with baseline psychological and emotional wellness were the most likely to regain optimal well-being,” they wrote. “They were almost five times more likely to achieve optimal well-being at time 2 than those who did not have psychological and emotional wellness at baseline.”However, the researchers noted that Canadian residents have free access to health care, which means these findings might not fully apply to the U.S., where residents must pay for health care and might not get the help they need to rebound from illness or injury.“Future research is needed in other high-income countries, such as the USA, which do not offer lifelong free medical care,” researchers wrote.More informationHarvard Medical School has more on getting the most from your remaining years.SOURCES: PLOS One, news release, Sept. 24, 2025; PLOS One, Sept. 24, 2025.What This Means For YouGood emotional and mental health can help seniors recover from physical problems and achieve optimal well-being, researchers said..Sign up for our weekly HealthDay newsletter