ABSTRACT
Increasingly, researchers have found it beneficial to conceptualize retirement as not a one-time event, but a dynamic process that includes elements of retirement planning, retirement decision-making (e.g., early retirement, full retirement, or bridge employment), and post-retirement transition and adjustment (Wang et al. 2011). Research also shows that each retirement situation is unique to the individual (Wang and Shultz 2010; Wang 2007). Indeed, what it means to ‘retire’ can be interpreted in many ways, such as (1) lack of paid employment, (2) receipt of pension and/or retirement benefits, (3) exit from one’s main employer, (4) reduced work hours, (5) hours worked or earnings received from work below some arbitrary cutoff, (6) changing employers late in one’s career, (7) self-assessment of being retired, and (8) some combination of the previous definitions (Denton and Spencer 2009). For many individuals retirement can mean complete withdrawal from work, re-entering the workforce in another capacity, or even continuing to work past the age of qualification for social security benefits and pensions.
