We request renewal of our ongoing study of Buffers of the Impairment/Disability Cascade for five years, to achieve four primary aims that allow for major conceptual and methodological contributions: (1) test of our innovative proactivity-based model of health maintenance and successful aging (Kahana & Kahana, 1996; 2003); (2) generalize the model across socidemographic contexts; (3) generalize the model across temporal contexts (age cohorts); and (4) extend the follow-up of long-term surviving members of our original sample from 14 to 18 years. We plan annual longitudinal follow-ups with a representative sample of 1,250 participants recruited from our two original study communities (On Top of the World Retirement Community in Clearwater, Florida, and Cleveland, Ohio) and from two newly added communities (Celebration, Florida, and Miami, Florida). Recognizing the growing diversity of lifestyles and ethnic backgrounds of the aged of the 21st Century, we will recruit Cuban-Hispanic study participants, and older adults who live in communities supporting age-integrated living, high levels of technology use, and social engagement. We thus maximize our understanding of the range and efficacy of proactive adaptations used by diverse older adults. Our cross-sequential cohort design will also permit comparison of a birth cohort of older adults who entered our original study 14 years ago with a birth cohort of the same age (70-83) entering the study 14 years later. Interviews will be conducted by trained interviewers with respondents randomly selected from Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services lists. Attrition rates of 7-13 percent per year are estimated to yield a total sample size of 920 respondents during the final fourth year follow-up. To the extent the proposed model is supported across a broad range of communities and study populations and in two different cohorts, the causal relationships proposed would appear to be highly generalizable, rather than being restricted to unique and homogeneous groups of elders. We can realistically aim to achieve the ambitious goals of our planned study because it is closely linked to continuing our long-term research on Buffers of the Impairment/Disability Cascade among the Old-Old, which provides a committed cohort of long-term study participants, a closely collaborating research team, and an infrastructure of fieldwork experience and measurement resources.
