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When does cognitive functioning peak? The asynchronous rise and fall of different cognitive abilities across the life span.

ABSTRACT: Understanding how and when cognitive change occurs over the life span is a prerequisite for understanding normal and abnormal development and aging. Most studies of cognitive change are constrained, however, in their ability to detect subtle, but theoretically informative life-span changes, as they rely on either comparing broad age groups or sparse sampling across the age range. Here, we present convergent evidence from 48,537 online participants and a comprehensive analysis of normative data from standardized IQ and memory tests. Our results reveal considerable heterogeneity in when cognitive abilities peak: Some abilities peak and begin to decline around high school graduation; some abilities plateau in early adulthood, beginning to decline in subjects' 30s; and still others do not peak until subjects reach their 40s or later. These findings motivate a nuanced theory of maturation and age-related decline, in which multiple, dissociable factors differentially affect different domains of cognition.

SUBMITTER: Hartshorne JK

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4441622 | biostudies-literature | 2015 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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When does cognitive functioning peak? The asynchronous rise and fall of different cognitive abilities across the life span.

Hartshorne Joshua K JK Germine Laura T LT

Psychological science 20150313 4

Understanding how and when cognitive change occurs over the life span is a prerequisite for understanding normal and abnormal development and aging. Most studies of cognitive change are constrained, however, in their ability to detect subtle, but theoretically informative life-span changes, as they rely on either comparing broad age groups or sparse sampling across the age range. Here, we present convergent evidence from 48,537 online participants and a comprehensive analysis of normative data f ...[more]

PMID: 25770099

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Project description:BackgroundSelf-management abilities seem to be important for the cognitive functioning of older people, especially those who are frail. We investigated relationships between broad self-management abilities (initiative taking, investment behavior, resource variety, resource multifunctionality, self-efficacy, and positive frame of mind) and cognitive functioning among frail older people while controlling for background characteristics (sex, age, marital status, and educational level).MethodSurvey data were collected from mid-2014 to mid-2015 from community-dwelling frail older people residing in North Brabant, the Netherlands. We measured cognitive functioning with the 12-item Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE-12) and self-management abilities with the short version of the Self-Management Ability Scale (SMAS-S).ResultsIn total, 588 of 834 potential participants were willing to participate (70.5% response rate). The mean age was 82.33 ± 5.19 and the majority (68.5%) of respondents were female. About one-third (38.4%) of respondents had low educational levels and 61.7% lived alone. Mean MMSE-12 and SMAS-S scores were 9.68 ± 2.10 and 3.70 ± 0.88, respectively. Bivariate analyses showed that all six self-management abilities were related positively to cognitive functioning. Multivariate analyses with adjustment for background characteristics (sex, age, marital status, and educational level) showed that cognitive functioning was associated positively with initiative taking (β = 0.23, p = 0.030) and investment behavior (β = 0.24, p = 0.030) among community-dwelling frail older people.ConclusionsThis study clearly showed that a repertoire of broad self-management abilities is related to cognitive functioning among community-dwelling frail older people. Initiative taking and investment behavior seem to be especially important. These findings are of interest in a time of populational aging and an increasing number of older people dealing with cognitive problems. Preventive investments in (older) people's self-management abilities are expected to be beneficial for their cognitive functioning in the long term.

Dataset Information

When does cognitive functioning peak? The asynchronous rise and fall of different cognitive abilities across the life span.

Publications

When does cognitive functioning peak? The asynchronous rise and fall of different cognitive abilities across the life span.

Similar Datasets

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