Feeling Younger in Rural Burkina Faso: Exploring the Role of Subjective Age in the Light of Previous Research From High-Income Countries

Abstract

Objectives: Previous research on subjective age (SA), that is, how young or old a person feels relative to their chronological age, has shown that older adults tend to feel younger than they are (by about 15%-20%), but the extent of this effect depends, in part, on their health. However, as most of the studies have been conducted in Western countries, it is unclear how well these results generalize to culturally different samples. Objectives, therefore, were to examine SA in middle-aged and older adults from a very low-income setting in rural Burkina Faso, to examine associations between SA and health/quality of life-related measures, and to compare findings with Western studies.

Methods: Representative, cross-sectional sample of N = 3,028 adults (≥40 years, recruited in 2018) from north-western Burkina Faso. Data included questionnaires on depression (Patient Health Questionnaire-9) and quality of life (World Health Organization Quality of Life scale, including subjective health) as well as performance-based and objective health-related measures (Community Screening Instrument for Dementia as cognitive screening, walking speed).

Results: Respondents felt on average 3% younger (SD = 0.13) than their chronological age, with 48% (95% confidence interval: 0.46-0.50) feeling younger-27 percentage points lower than seen in representative Western studies. Lower depression, better walking speed, cognition, and quality of life were all associated with younger SA.

Discussion: Middle-aged and older adults in Nouna felt less young than similar age groups in Western studies. One of the reasons may be that youthfulness is less of a value outside Western cultures. As in Western studies, parts of the variation in SA can be explained by health parameters.

Keywords: Cross-cultural differences; Health; Stereotypes; Views on aging.

Figure 1.

Felt age across the span of chronological age in (A) the Nouna Study (N = 3,028) and (B) in a Western reference by Rubin and Berntsen (N = 1,470; Rubin & Berntsen, 2006, p. 779). Dashed line functions as a reference that indicates Felt Age (in years; y-axis) equal to Chronological Age (in years; x-axis). In both (A) and (B) dots are means and whiskers show the standard deviation. Before the calculation of these descriptive summary measures, participants were grouped by chronological age (in bins of 5 years). Panel B is adapted from Rubin and Berntsen, 2006. Copyright [2006] by Springer Nature. Adapted with permission from Springer Nature Customer Center Service GmbH.

Figure 2.

Proportion of participants feeling younger in the two African studies versus in a selection of comparable Western studies. Data are reported in Macia et al. (2012) for Senegal, Dakar; Rubin and Berntsen (2006) for the Danish sample; Stephan et al. (2018) for the USA: Midlife in the United States and Health and Retirement Study; and Demakakos et al. (2007) for the UK: English Longitudinal Study of Ageing. In all studies, the minimum recruitment age was 40–50 years, with an effort for a representative sample.

Figure 3.

Estimates of the associations (with 95% CIs) between a range of specific diseases and Subjective Age as proportional score (N = 3,028). Estimates are controlled for demographics (age, sex, household size, education). For each estimate associated with a condition, the reference is participants without that condition. The number of cases for each disease in the data set is denoted by n. Only diseases with n ≥ 30 cases were included. Information on Hypertension and Diabetes was based on either objective physical examinations or self-report. Information on other diseases was based on self-report to a question of the format: Has your health care worker ever informed you that you have, e.g., heart disease?