What do we need to enjoy a successful retirement? 

In 2010, the National Seniors Productive Ageing Centre launched the Healthy Ageing Quiz – to provide practical tips to assist with ageing well.

This quiz focused on a broad concept of healthy ageing with a range of predominately health indicators (physical activity, balance, smoking and alcohol use) as well as some measures of social connectiveness and productive engagement. 

Since the publication of the 2010 quiz, much work at National Seniors Australia has been undertaken on retirement planning and productive engagement during retirement. 

A question that is often raised from this research is what kinds of people adjust to retirement well and others not so well? Similarly, how can mature age people track their retirement adjustment? This provided the need for a Retirement Quiz.

Given that the number of Australians transitioning into retirement will increase in coming years, it is important that pre-retirees, and the public in general, understand about preparing for the transition into retirement, and what strategies are successful to ensure a good quality of life in retirement. 

This Productive Ageing Centre research report details a Retirement Quiz, developed at the School of Psychology at the University of New South Wales with funding from National Seniors Australia, that is based on new research into successful retirement. The Quiz assesses retirement preparedness in terms of three subscales measuring different types of resources: Health and Finances, Social Resources, and Emotional, Cognitive and Motivational Resources. 

We hope the Retirement Quiz will help Australians approaching retirement to assess their resources for retirement, as well as aid retirees with starting a conversation about setting new goals.

Download the full report below.