Abstract
As retirement is widely considered as a major life change in older adults, the extensive research investigated the risk factors of well-being and vulnerability after retirement. As vulnerability is the outcome of complex interactions of multiple risks and lack of resources, the emergence, and evolvement of vulnerability will include multi-dimensional aspects, such as risk to poverty, health, social engagement, and depression. This study aims to explore patterns of multi-dimensional vulnerability of retirees, and examine the association between profiles of vulnerability and well-being. Our sample included 2,617 retirees who aged 65+ of Health and Retirement Study. Latent class analysis was utilized to identify the heterogeneous patterns of vulnerability, and then a series of OLS regression analyses were conducted to examine the relationship between patterns of vulnerability and well-being. Four vulnerability patterns were identified: Physical and psychological vulnerable (13%), Social vulnerable (35%), Low vulnerable (37%) and Material vulnerable (15%). The regression analysis showed that those who are in material vulnerable, social vulnerable, physical and psychological vulnerable groups had significantly lower well-being compared to those who are in low-vulnerable group after controlling for age, gender, education, and retirement voluntariness. In particular, physical and psychological vulnerability predicted the lower well-being than other types of vulnerability. Our study provides the empirical evidence that various patterns of vulnerability predicted different levels of well-being after retirement. This result expanded the current literature on retirement by suggesting the potential risk of the physical and psychological vulnerable group in postretirement. Implications for future research and services will be discussed.