ge of retirement research.
To discuss retirement as a condition of the culture is perforce to discuss a change in the pattern of everyday living, specifically the transition out of one social role to another. The psychology of social-role transition is at the core of an examination of elements of worker and retiree self-esteem, in particular the relative strength of well-being and depression in each group. According to Reitzes, Mutran, and Fernandez (1996), who tracked workers for two years before their retirement and followed them into the first stage of retirement, retirement per se does not have a negative influence on self-esteem. The study looked at the degree to which preretirement workers conceptualized their career roles as the basis for self-esteem and whether that concept influenced levels of well-being and depression for retired and working persons. By extension, it looked at ways in which workers and retirees appear to "learn" their social roles in and out of the work force, both identifying what those roles are and identifying with them: "In
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