Victoria Michalowski

• Simon Fraser University

Objective: Positive as well as negative emotional experiences fluctuate and they may be shared between romantic partners. Everyday emotion dynamics in couples may relate to physiological stress responses, with accompanying cortisol secretion being one pathway through which emotional dynamics can "get under the skin." We examined time-varying relat...

Older adults often have long-term relationships, and many of their goals are intertwined with their respective partners. Joint goals can help or hinder goal progress. Little is known about how accurately older adults assess if a goal is joint, the role of over-reporting in these perceptions, and how joint goals and over-reporting may relate to olde...

Being able to progress on and accomplish personal goals is an important source of satisfaction and meaning across the adult lifespan and into old age. This study focuses on the importance of close others, such as spouses, for facilitating goal progress when individual resources may no longer suffice. We used multilevel modelling to analyze data fro...

Objective: Social relationships can have positive and negative influences, and these associations are particularly pronounced in old age. This study focuses on everyday interpersonal physiological dynamics (cortisol synchrony) in older couples and investigates its associations with partner presence, positive daily partner interactions, and empathy...

Empathic accuracy involves identifying the emotions of others. Most evidence is based on younger samples, which is limiting because of well-established motivational shifts that occur in older adulthood. Here, we examine associations between fluctuations in happiness and empathic accuracy, using momentary assessments of happiness from 107 couples (...

Romantic partners exhibit dyadic covariation (synchrony) in physiological parameters. This study aims to link everyday cortisol synchrony to daily partner interactions and empathy. We conducted coordinated multilevel analysis using data from two independently collected samples of older couples (Study 1: N = 85 couples, aged 60-87 years; Study 2: N...

Goals often involve close others such as spouses, but we know little about how this helps or hinders goal progress and what couple consequences arise. To examine these questions, we investigate associations between joint goals, goal progress, and relationship satisfaction by applying multi-level modeling to data from 119 couples (50% female; Mage=7...

Objectives: We explored associations between co-habiting partners for sedentary behavior (type and time, via accelerometry and self-report), gender, and a surrogate health measure (inflammatory biomarker: C-reactive protein, CRP). Methods: Participants completed activity questionnaires and the Timed Up and Go (mobility), wore an accelerometer for 7...

Background Overall time spent in moderate-to-vigorous intensity physical activity (MVPA) and sedentary behavior are both correlated in couples. Knowledge about the nature and psychosocial correlates of such dyadic covariation could inform important avenues for physical activity promotion. Purpose The present study investigates hour-by-hour covaria...

Objective. Experimental research has demonstrated that individuals with higher physical activity levels show reduced cortisol responses to psychosocial stress. The present study takes this research out of the lab and it extends these findings by investigating whether older adults’ physical activity also moderates everyday-life within-person associa...

Everyday salivary cortisol is a popular biomarker that is uniquely suited to address key lifespan developmental questions. Specifically, it can be used to shed light on the time-varying situational characteristics that elicit acute stress responses as individuals navigate their everyday lives across the adult lifespan (intraindividual variability)....

Positive affect variability is associated with worsening mental and physical health outcomes (Ong & Ram, 2017). Less is known about the mechanisms underlying such associations. This study uses 21 simultaneous momentary assessments of target happiness and perceiver ratings from both partners in 119 older couples (M age = 71.0 years; M relationship d...

Couples not only share their everyday lives but there is also evidence that they are physiologically ‘in sync’. This study aims to link everyday salivary cortisol synchrony to partner closeness and health biomarkers. We used multilevel modelling to analyze data from 85 older couples (aged 60–87 years) who completed questionnaires and provided saliv...

Objectives: Spousal support within marriage may be particularly important in old age when spouses become more likely to rely on each other's help. However, spousal support does not have to be unanimously positive. In fact, very little is known about covariations in spousal affect and aches as couples engage in their daily routines and environments...