The Research On The Intertemporal Choice Of The Older Adults And Its Influence Factor

Intertemporal choice is closely related to people’s daily life.These choice,ranging from the basic necessities of daily life to the public announcement policies of enterprises,society and even the state.Nowadays,the number of the elderly population in our country remains high,the trend of aging is getting worse,and people pay more and more attention to the intertemporal decision-making of the elderly.Because it is related to the medical and health security,investment and financial management,retirement plans and many other aspects of the elder.At present,the research on intertemporal decision-making of the elderly still has some limitations.First,most of the research is based on the western background,lack of localization research.Second,there is a lack of discussion on the factors affecting the intertemporal decision-making of the elderly.Therefore,this study consists of two parts.The first part studies the characteristics of intertemporal decision-making of the elderly and explores the decision-making differences between the elderly and the young,including two reward domains(monetary and healthy).The second part is how the poverty and anxiety influence the intertemporal decision-making of the older.A 2(subject type)× 2(task difficulty)two-factor mixed design was conduced to the effect of the aging on intertemporal choice in study 1.It was divided into two experimental tasks: money domain and health domain.The independent variables were subject type(older adults,adults)and task difficulty(difficult task,easy task);the dependent variable was the probability of subjects choosing the immediate reward option.The results revealed that(1)In the money domain,the main effect of subject type was not significant,the main effect of task difficulty was significant,and the interaction between task difficulty and subject type was significant.Further simple effects analysis revealed that in the difficult task,the probability of choosing the immediate reward option was significantly higher for older adults than for younger adults.In addition,both older and younger people were more likely to choose a small immediate reward when faced with a difficult task compared to an easy task.(2)In the health domain,the main effect of subject type was significant,the main effect of task difficulty was significant,and the interaction between subject type and task difficulty was significant.After simple effects analysis,it was found that older people were significantly more likely to choose the immediate reward option than younger people.In addition to this,young people’s intertemporal decision making was moderated by task difficulty,and the probability of choosing immediate reward was higher under difficult tasks compared to simple tasks.The subjects were screened by questionnaire before study 2.Volunteers are divided into the poor group and non-poor group;high anxiety group and low anxiety group.The results found that(1)in the money domain,the main effect of subject type was not significant,the main effect of task difficulty was significant,and its interaction was not significant,which indicated that there is no significant difference in intertemporal decision-making between the poor elderly and the non poor elderly,and the probability of choosing immediate reward was higher under the difficult task;however,in the health domain,the main effect of subject type was significant,the main effect of task difficulty was not significant,and the interaction between subject type and task difficulty was not significant.After a simple analysis,it was found that the probability of choosing the immediate reward option was significantly higher for poor older adults than for non-poor older adults in both the easy and difficult tasks.(2)In the money domain,the main effect of subject type was significant,the main effect of task difficulty was significant,and its interaction was not significant.After conducting the analysis,it was found that the probability of choosing the immediate reward option was lower for high-anxiety older adults compared to low-anxiety older adults in both easy and difficult tasks,and subjects were more likely to choose the immediate reward option in difficult tasks compared to easy tasks;in the health domain,the main effect of subject type was significant,the main effect of task difficulty was not significant,and the interaction was not significant,and after a simple analysis,it was found that high-anxious older adults were less likely to choose immediate reward than low-anxious older adults.Based on these findings,the conclusions are as follows:(1)In the money domain,age did not significantly influence intertemporal decision-making outcomes,but older adults were more likely than younger adults to choose large delayed rewards for difficult tasks.At the same time,the preference of the two groups adjusted by the task difficulty,that is,compared with the difficult task,the probability of choosing delay of gratification is higher under the simple task.(2)In the health domain,age significantly influence intertemporal decision making,especially in simple tasks,where older people are more likely to choose small immediate rewards than younger people.At the same time,the younger subjects were influenced by task difficulty in intertemporal choice,while the older subjects were not.(3)Poverty has different effects on the intertemporal choices of the elderly in different domains.In the money domain,poverty status did not significantly affect the results of the intertemporal decision making,and the choice preferences of older adults were adjusted by task difficulty;In the health domain,poor older adults are more likely to choose small-immediate rewards than non-poor older adults.(4)Anxiety can significantly affect the results of intertemporal decision-making in the elderly.Whether in the money domain or health domain,older adults with high levels of anxiety are more likely to delay gratification.At the same time,in the domain of money,the intertemporal decision-making outcome of the elderly is regulated by the task difficulty,that is,compared with the difficult task,the probability of choosing delay of gratification is higher under the simple task.