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The Americans' Changing Lives (ACL) survey series is an ongoing, nationally representative, longitudinal study focusing especially on differences between Black and White Americans in middle and late life. These data constitute the first, second, third, fourth, fifth, and sixth waves in a panel survey covering a wide range of sociological, psychological, mental, and physical health items. Wave I of the study began in 1986 with a nation face-to-face survey of 3,617 adults ages 25 and up, with Black Americans and people aged 60 and over over-sampled at twice the rate of the others. Wave II constitutes face-to-face re-interviews in 1989 of those still alive. Survivors have been re-interviewed by telephone, and when necessary face-to-face, in 1994 (Wave III), 2001/02 (Wave IV), 2011 (Wave V), and 2019/21 (Wave VI).

Please note that for Wave VI, the majority of data collection occurred in 2019, with only a small subset (n=39) of participants surveyed in 2021.

ACL was designed and sought to investigate the following: (1) The ways in which a wide range of activities and social relationships that people engage in are broadly "productive," (2) how individuals adapt to acute life events and chronic stresses that threaten the maintenance of health, effective functioning, and productive activity, and (3) sociocultural variations in the nature, meaning, determinants, and consequences of productive activity and relationships. Among the topics covered are interpersonal relationships (spouse/partner, children, parents, friends), sources and levels of satisfaction, social interactions and leisure activities, traumatic life events (physical assault, serious illness, divorce, death of a loved one, financial or legal problems), perceptions of retirement, health behaviors (smoking, alcohol consumption, overweight, rest), and utilization of health care services (doctor visits, hospitalization, nursing home institutionalization, bed days). Also included are measures of physical health, psychological well-being, and indices referring to cognitive functioning.

Demographic information provided for individuals includes household composition, number of children and grandchildren, employment status, occupation and work history, income, family financial situation, religious beliefs and practices, ethnicity, race, education, sex, and region of residence.

These data are part of NACJD's Fast Track Release and are distributed as they were received from the data depositor. The files have been zipped by NACJD for release, but not checked or processed except for the removal of direct identifiers. Users should refer to the accompanying readme file for a brief description of the files available with this collection and consult the investigator(s) if further information is needed.

The purpose of this study was to investigate violence and aggression committed by nursing home residents that is directed toward other residents, referred to here as resident-to-resident elder mistreatment (R-REM). Resident-to-resident mistreatment (R-REM) was defined as: negative and aggressive physical, sexual, or verbal interactions between long term care residents, that in a community setting would likely be construed as unwelcome and have high potential to cause physical or psychological distress in the recipient.

The goals of this project were to: enhance institutional recognition of R-REM; examine the convergence of R-REM reports across different methodologies; identify the most accurate mechanism for detecting and reporting R-REM; develop profiles of persons involved with R-REM by reporting source; investigate existing R-REM policies, and; develop institutional guidelines for reporting R-REM episodes. Also, the project team sought to answer the following research questions: (1) Will the reporting of R-REM differ by source? (2) Which reporting methods will show the highest level of convergence and accuracy in reporting? (3) What resident characteristics or profiles will predict R-REM across the differing reporting sources? (4) What are the existing guidelines and/or institutional policies for reporting R-REM? To achieve these goals, the researcher conducted this study over a two week period in five urban and five suburban New York City facilities. Resident-to-resident abuse information was derived from five sources: (1) resident interviews (2) staff informants (3) observational data (behavior sheets) (4) resident chart reviews (5) incident and accident reports.