Pristavec, Teja

Objective: Informal caregivers are crucial to maintaining older adults' health, but few studies examine how caregiving receipt is associated with older person longevity.

Caregiving experiences matter for caregivers’ own wellbeing, but few studies link caregivers’ burden and benefit perceptions with recipient outcomes. Following the stress process model, I prospectively explore how caregivers’ experiences shape recipients’ mental health. I match US National Health and Aging Trends Study and National Study of Caregivers, employing logistic regression on 781 older adult-informal caregiver dyads.

Background and Objectives: Informal caregiving to older adults is a key part of the U.S. long-term care system. Caregivers' experiences consist of burden and benefits, but traditional analytic approaches typically consider dimensions independently, or cannot account for burden and benefit levels and combinations that co-occur.