Contributing factors of psychological well-being in midlife women: A literature review

Introduction: Psychological well-being is a subjective concept which consisted of both thepresence of positive affect and lack of symptoms of distress, and it is considered generally stable inindividuals across lifetime. Given the importance of general psychological well-being in middleaged women, the aim of this study was to evaluate the contributing factors of psychological wellbeingin midlife women.Materials and Methods: In this study, we searched databases such as Google Scholar, PubMed,MEDLINE, ScienceDirect, Ovid and Web of Sciences with the key words psychological wellbeing,midlife, menopause, risk factors from 1994 to 2016. Initially 21 articles were extracted. Afterreading the full text, 14 articles were chosen for writing the current review article.Results: Contributing factors of psychological well-being were classified in three main categories.They include psychosocial factors (chronic exposure to stress, absence of psychiatric symptoms,attitude toward menopause and aging, interpersonal stress, insecure house status, low economicsecurity and care of old parents), life styles factors (smoking, level of physical activity, poor healthstatus, prolonged severe vasomotor symptoms), demographic factors (higher age, obesity, livingwith partner, and chronic diseases). Of those above-mentioned factors, experiencing prolongedsevere vasomotor symptoms, obesity, care of other such as old parents, smoking, chronic diseases,low economic security, higher age, chronic exposure to stress and insecure house status wereassociated with lowered psychological well-being. In contrast absence of psychiatric symptoms,low levels of interpersonal stress, positive attitude toward menopause and aging, living with partner,higher physical activity and better health status were linked with higher psychological well-being.Conclusion: Social, demographic and lifestyle factors need to be taken into account whenevaluating women’s mental health and well-being in midlife.

کلیدواژه ها:

Psychological well-being ، midlife ، menopause ، risk factors