Background

Perceived stress decreases memory performance and escalates the risk of developing cognitive impairment. Despite these concerning cognitive outcomes, longitudinal assessment of the relationship between perceived stress and memory complaints within a racially diverse sample remains scant.

Method

391 cognitively intact older adults (M = 77.31, SD = 4.75) from the Einstein Aging Study were measured annually for up to nine years. Memory complaint items included self-reported frequency of forgetfulness, one-year memory decline, and 10-year memory decline. Multilevel models examined between-person and within-person associations between perceived stress and memory complaints while controlling for demographic differences and neuroticism.

Results

Strong between-person associations emerged such that older adults with generally higher perceived stress were more likely to report memory complaints, and vice versa. No significant concurrent within-person associations emerged. One lagged association emerged showing that within-person increases in perceived stress translated to a higher likelihood of reporting 10-year memory decline at the next annual screening.

Conclusion

Older adults with higher perceived stress are at risk for memory complaints over time. Further research into the relationship between perceived stress and memory complaints is necessary to augment our understanding of how risk factors of cognitive decline present throughout the aging process.

Objectives

To examine relationships between subjective memory impairment (SMI) and parental dementia among in older adults while considering the interactive influence of depressive symptoms, ethnicity, and race.

Method

The sample was drawn from the Health and Retirement Study, a nationally representative longitudinal study of aging (n = 3,809; M_age = 66.09; SD = 1.88; 84.20% White; 12.23% Black; 7.88% Hispanic). Biennial assessments included two measures of SMI (current memory problems and perceived memory decline), depressive symptoms, and parental dementia, over periods of up to sixteen years. Multilevel modeling analyses examined longitudinal relationships between parental dementia and SMI and whether depressive symptoms, ethnicity, and race interactively influenced this association.

Results

Results showed that when older adults reported parental dementia, they were more likely to report a decline in memory in the past two years. They also reported poorer current memory problems, especially when they experienced increased depressive symptoms. Associations of parental dementia were consistent across ethnicity and race.

Conclusions

Results demonstrate the importance of considering parental dementia as a factor that may contribute to SMI in older adults.

Across midlife and into old age, older adults often report lower levels of negative affect and similar if not higher levels of positive affect than relatively younger adults. Researchers have offered a simple explanation for this result: Age is related to reductions in stressors and increases in pleasurable activities that result in higher levels of well-being. The current study examines subjective reports of emotional experience assessed across 8 days in a large sample of adults (N = 2,022) ranging from 35 to 84 years old. By modeling age differences before and after adjusting for daily positive uplifts and negative stressors, this article assesses the extent to which daily events account for age differences in positive and negative affect reports. Consistent with previous research, the authors found that older age is related to lower mean levels and shorter duration of a negative emotional experience in a model only adjusting for gender, education, and ethnicity. After adjusting for daily events, however, the linear age-related effects were no longer significant. For positive affect, adjusting for daily events did not alter age-related patterns of experiencing higher mean levels and longer positive experience duration, suggesting that other factors underlie age-related increases in positive affect. (PsycINFO Database Record

OBJECTIVES: The current study examined the factor structure of emotional experience across adults 34-50, 51-65, and 66-84 year olds. METHOD: Participants (N = 2,022) were asked about 14 negative and 13 positive emotions across 8 days in the National Study of Daily Experiences II study. Factor analysis computed both inter-individual factors (between-person structure of emotional experience) and intra-individual factors (factors describing emotions in daily life) for each age group. RESULTS: For inter-individual variation, one positive and one negative factor captured emotions experienced for the first two age groups, but the 66 to 84-year-old adults had an additional factor for anger. For intra-individual variation, two factors (fear and sadness; anger) captured negative emotions for the first two age groups. The oldest age group had three negative factors: fear; anger (with additional sadness emotions); and sadness. Four factors captured positive emotions for the middle-aged groups and three for the oldest group; interpersonally oriented emotions (e.g. sense of belonging) were the primary sources of age differences. DISCUSSION: Findings suggest that subtle age differences exist in the factor structure of daily emotional experience when comparing middle-aged and older adults.

Research documents the pernicious effects of daily stressors on well-being, but often ignored in these studies are people reporting no stressors. The current study compared adults who reported no daily stressors with adults who reported at least one stressor across 8 consecutive days on measures of well-being. Of the 2,804 respondents (age range = 25-75 years, M = 53.46) from the Midlife in the United State Survey daily diary study, 10% reported experiencing no stressors across 8 days. Those reporting no stressors were generally older, male, unmarried, and were less likely to work, provide or receive emotional support, or experience positive daily events. They reported greater daily affective well-being and fewer chronic health conditions but had lower levels of cognitive functioning. Findings suggest that daily stressors may serve as a proxy to engagement in social activities, where a lower level of engagement is related to better physical and emotional well-being but lower levels of cognitive functioning. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved).

Many types of items are used to measure self-reported cognition, resulting in heterogeneity across studies. Certain cognitive self-report measure types may be more predictive of future decline. Therefore, the purpose of this systematic review was to compare whether specific types of cognitive self-report measures better predict risk for cognitive decline over time when measures are directly compared within the same study. The PRISMA criteria guided the review. Eligibility criteria included: longitudinal studies, outcome of cognitive decline, at least 2 different cognitive self-report measures, and no cognitive impairment at baseline. Nineteen studies were included in the final review. A narrative synthesis of results was completed, resulting in 3 thematic groups of comparisons across self-reported measure types. Self-reported memory decline with worry and peer perceptions of memory were associated with the highest risk for cognitive decline. Future longitudinal investigations of self-reported cognitive problems should focus on using measures that may be most sensitive to predicting cognitive decline risk.

Cortisol features prominently in theories describing how chronic stress wears away at physical and cognitive health. The current study examines composite measures of physiological and cognitive functioning in relation to two aspects of daily cortisol: total daily output and change in levels throughout the day. Participants (N = 1001; aged 28-84 years-old) from the Midlife Development in the United States (MIDUS) study provided 4 daily saliva samples across four consecutive days and underwent a physical exam that provided information about six inter-related physiological systems that were combined into a measure of allostatic load. They also completed a phone-based battery of cognitive tasks, which provided a composite score combining memory, reasoning, and speed of processing performance. Total daily cortisol output was captured using area under the curve with respect to ground (AUCg). Change in cortisol levels was assessed using two methods: slope, calculated through piecewise spline models, and dynamic range, calculated by the difference between the day's highest and lowest log-cortisol levels. Findings indicate that, when examined together, overall cortisol output was not associated with either outcome, but a greater range in cortisol throughout the day was associated with both lower allostatic load and higher cognitive functioning. Results emphasize the importance of dynamic daily processes, assessed either using slopes or dynamic range, to both physiological and cognitive functioning.

Despite the prominence of time in influential aging theories and the ubiquity of stress across the life span, research addressing how time perspective (TP) and adversity are associated with well-being across adulthood is rare. Examining the role of TP in coping with life events over the life span would be best accomplished after large-scale population-based exposure to a specific event, with repeated assessments to examine within- and between-person differences over time. A national sample aged 18-91 years (N = 722, M = 49.4 years) was followed for 3 years after the September 11, 2001 (9/11) terrorist attacks. Respondents completed assessments of 9/11-related television (TV) exposure 9-21 days after the attacks, temporal disintegration 2 months post-9/11, and TP, ongoing stress, and well-being at 12, 24, and 36 months post-9/11. Results provided support for measurement invariance of TP across time and across age. Early 9/11-related TV exposure was significantly associated with greater temporal disintegration. Temporal disintegration and ongoing stress, in turn, were associated with between- and within-person variation in past TP. This effect was qualified by an age interaction that indicated a stronger relationship between ongoing stress and past TP for younger compared with older adults. Past and future TP were significantly and independently related to individual differences and within-person variation in psychological well-being, regardless of age. Future work should incorporate adversity as an important correlate of TP across adulthood. (PsycINFO Database Record

Neighborly cohesiveness has documented benefits for health. Furthermore, high perceived neighborhood cohesion offsets the adverse health effects of neighborhood socioeconomic adversity. One potential way neighborhood cohesion influences health is through daily stress processes. The current study uses participants (n = 2022, age 30-84 years) from The Midlife in the United States II and the National Study of Daily Experiences II, collected between 2004 and 2006, to examine this hypothesis using a within-person, daily diary design. We predicted that people who perceive high neighborhood cohesion are exposed to fewer daily stressors, such as interpersonal arguments, lower daily physical symptoms and negative affect, and higher daily positive affect. We also hypothesized that perceptions of neighborhood cohesion buffer decline in affective and physical well-being on days when daily stressors do occur. Results indicate that higher perceived neighborhood cohesion predicts fewer self-reported daily stressors, higher positive affect, lower negative affect, and fewer physical health symptoms. High perceived neighborhood cohesion also buffers the effects of daily stressors on negative affect, even after adjusting for other sources of social support. Results from the present study suggest interventions focusing on neighborhood cohesion may result in improved well-being and may minimize the adverse effect of daily stressors.