Does pain dampen future outlooks? Examining daily and decadal time horizons

Soc Sci Med. 2026 Oct 12;410:119919. doi: 10.1016/j.socscimed.2026.119919. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND: Positive future orientations are increasingly recognized as both a health-promoting resource and an intrinsic aspect of human well-being, while dampened outlooks represent a form of deprivation. This article considers whether pain-a defining corollary of contemporary collective despair-has implications for how people imagine their futures in the short- and longer-term.

METHODS: We use daily diary and survey data from the Midlife in the United States (MIDUS) study to consider two distinct time horizons: expectations for tomorrow and decade-out life trajectories. Study 1 assesses whether number of daily pain sites is linked to expectations for positive and stressful next-day experiences, while Study 2 uses conventional survey data to examine how chronic pain interference relates to future expectations across multiple domains of life. Both studies employ hybrid between-within panel models to decompose within-person variance at each time scale alongside more stable between-person differences.

RESULTS: Day-to-day occurrences of pain are associated with more pessimistic next-day anticipations, as reflected by within-person increases predicting higher odds of expected stress and lower odds of uplifts (Study 1). Chronic pain interference, meanwhile, modestly dampens decade-out expectations (Study 2), with work, financial, and health outlooks most discernibly susceptible.

CONCLUSION: Our two-study design provides novel evidence that pain does indeed "cast a shadow" over both short-term and longer-term future orientations. In this sense, pain constitutes not only a biopsychosocial clinical symptom but also a threat to how people are able to inhabit time.

PMID:42901025 | DOI:10.1016/j.socscimed.2026.119919