Life After Work: Use of time and activity patterns across the retirement transition

How health and use of time changes as people transition into retirement

Status

Recruiting

Phases

Unknown

Study type

Observational

Source

ANZCTR

Registry ID

ACTRN12613000230752

Acronym

LAW

Enrollment

120

Registered

2013-02-27

Start date

2012-06-30

Completion date

2013-07-15

Last updated

2020-01-13

For informational purposes only — not medical advice. Sourced from public registries and may not reflect the latest updates. Terms

Conditions

None listed

Brief summary

The Australian population is ageing, with a disproportionately large burden of disease incurred in older people. Retirement, as a major life transition, may offer an important opportunity for intervening on health behaviours. The primary aim of the Life After Work study is to comprehensively measure changes in activity patterns, health and well-being across the retirement transition, using a use-of-time approach, with the view to inform further health behaviour interventions for this population. A target sample of 120 participants aged 50 years and over who are about to retire will be recruited in two major Australian cities, Adelaide and Brisbane. Participants will undertake a battery of assessments approximately 3 months prior to retirement, and 3, 6 and 12 months post-retirement. Assessments will include self-reported use of time (using the Multimedia Activity Recall for Children and Adults), objective physical activity and sedentary behaviour (using Actigraph GT3X+ accelerometers), self-reported health status and well-being (using a battery of surveys, including the Short-Form Health Survey (SF-36) , the Australian Unity Personal Well-being Index (AUPWI), the Depression Anxiety Stress Scales, the Short Warwick-Edinburgh Mental Well-being Scale, the UCLA Loneliness Scale, the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale), retirement circumstances and socio-demographic items, objective anthropometric measures (height, weight and waist circumference), and resting blood pressure. The results will allow a robust examination of the changes in use of time, health and well-being across retirement. The results will provide important new information that will inform the development of lifestyle and policy interventions to address and improve health and well-being in retirement.

Interventions

This is a prospective longitudinal study. It is observational. People will undertake assessments approximately 3 months prior to retirement, and 3, 6 and 12 months post retirement. Assessments will include self-reported use of time, objective physical activity and sedentary behaviour (accelerometry), self-reported health and wellbeing, objective physical health (BMI, waist circumference and blood pressure) and sociodemographic items.

Eligibility

Sex/Gender

All

Age

50 Years to No maximum

Healthy volunteers

Yes

Inclusion criteria

1. Participant self-identifies as about to “retire”. 2. Aged over 50 years. 3. Date of anticipated retirement within 1-6 months at the time of baseline assessments. 4. Pre-retirement workload: >=19 hours per week in paid employment (i.e. working half-time or more). 5. Anticipated post-retirement workload: a) planning to undertaken <=11 hours per week paid employment (i.e. 1 and a half days per week), AND b) paid employment will have reduced by =>19 hours compared with pre-retirement levels. 6. Able to attend baseline and final assessments in Adelaide or Brisbane. 7. Able to speak and write in English.

Exclusion criteria

1. Presence of a major (life-threatening) medical condition or undergoing major treatment in the last 6 months.

Outcome results