Does confidence in the future matter in life satisfaction among older people in widowhood in China?

The empirical evidence regarding the relationship between confidence in the future and life satisfaction is little. This study strived to unmask the reciprocal effects between future confidence and life satisfaction among widowed older people in China. The subsample of 677 widowed older adults was extracted from the 2014, 2016, and 2018 waves of data of the China Family Panel Studies (CFPS). Cross-lagged and bivariate linear growth curve analyses were conducted together to investigate the longitudinally reciprocal relationship between confidence in the future and life satisfaction. In general, the results in this study verified the existing interactive relationships between future confidence and life satisfaction over time. Such reciprocal relationships were robust when control variables of interest were taken into consideration. This study was worthwhile in that it provided another point of view to improve life satisfaction among widowed older people in China from the perspective of confidence in the future. Discussions on the results were provided in detail.