• Posted May 11, 2026

Older Adults Have Fewer Regrets, Study Says

Feeling regretful over something in your past?

Odds are those feelings will fade over time, a new study says.

Older adults experience less frustration when they think about past mistakes and missed chances, even though they tend to have about the same number of regrets as younger folks, researchers reported May 7 in the journal Emotion.

Older folks also report fewer recent regrets than younger adults, researchers found.

“Regrets are incredibly common. Almost all of us experience big regrets in our personal and professional lives – from marrying the wrong person to never finishing college,” lead researcher Julia Nolte said in a news release. Nolte is an assistant professor of economic psychology at Tilburg University in the Netherlands.

“The good news is that for many of us, the experience of regret seems to become less negative with age,” she added.

For the new study, researchers surveyed 90 U.S. adults between 21 and 89 years of age, asking them to list up to five regrets from the past year and five long-term regrets.

The team then asked participants to focus on their most significant long-term and recent regret, describing and rating them in detail. Ratings included factors like how long ago they occurred, which emotions they evoked and what could be done to manage the regret.

Results showed that older adults reported fewer and less emotionally intense recent regrets.

They also tended to regret “missed chances” – times when they failed to act – more often than they regretted taking a wrong action, researchers found.

It’s not yet clear exactly why aging changes how people experience regret, or whether these differences reflect generational shifts rather than age differences, Nolte said.

Future research also might explore whether younger people and older adults experience regret for the same psychological reasons and purposes, Nolte said.

“It is assumed that regret helps us make better choices moving forward,” she said. “But older adults may derive other benefits from regret, such as a chance to reflect or look for meaning.”

More information

The University of Virginia has more on overcoming regret.

SOURCES: American Psychological Association, news release, May 7, 2026; Emotion, May 7, 2026