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Introduction: Loneliness has a rising public health impact, but research involving neuropathology and representative cohorts has been limited., Methods: Inverse odds of selection weights were generalized from the autopsy sample of Rush Alzheimer's Disease Center cohorts (N = 680; 89 ± 9 years old; 25% dementia) to the US-representative Health and Retirement Study (N = 8469; 76 ± 7 years old; 5% dementia) to extend external validity. Regressions tested cross-sectional associations between loneliness and (1) Alzheimer's disease (AD) and cerebrovascular pathology; (2) five cognitive domains; and (3) relationships between pathology and cognition, adjusting for depression., Results: In weighted models, greater loneliness was associated with microinfarcts, lower episodic and working memory in the absence of AD pathology, lower working memory in the absence of infarcts, a stronger association of infarcts with lower episodic memory, and a stronger association of microinfarcts with lower working and semantic memory., Discussion: Loneliness may relate to AD through multiple pathways involving cerebrovascular pathology and cognitive reserve., Highlights: Loneliness was associated with worse cognition in five domains. Loneliness was associated with the presence of microinfarcts. Loneliness moderated cognition-neuropathology associations. Transportability methods can provide insight into selection bias., (© 2024 The Author(s). Alzheimer's & Dementia published by Wiley Periodicals LLC on behalf of Alzheimer's Association.)

Background: Higher education consistently predicts improved late-life cognition. Racial differences in educational attainment likely contribute to inequities in dementia risk. However, few studies of education and cognition have controlled for prospectively measured early-life confounders or evaluated whether the education late-life cognition association is modified by race/ethnicity., Methods: Among 2343 Black and White Project Talent Aging Study participants who completed telephone cognitive assessments, we evaluated whether the association between years of education and cognition (verbal fluency, memory/recall, attention, and a composite cognitive measure) differed by race, and whether these differences persisted when adjusting for childhood factors, including the cognitive ability., Results: In fully adjusted linear regression models, each additional year of education was associated with higher composite cognitive scores for Black [β=0.137; 95% confidence interval (CI)=0.068, 0.206] and White respondents (β=0.056; CI=0.034, 0.078) with an interaction with race ( P =0.03). Associations between education and memory/recall among Black adults (β=0.036; CI=-0.037, 0.109) and attention among White adults (β=0.022; CI=-0.002, 0.046) were nonsignificant. However, there were significant race-education interactions for the composite ( P =0.03) and attention measures ( P <0.001) but not verbal fluency ( P =0.61) or memory/recall ( P =0.95)., Conclusion: Education predicted better overall cognition for both Black and White adults, even with stringent control for prospectively measured early-life confounders., Competing Interests: The authors declare no conflicts of interest., (Copyright © 2022 Wolters Kluwer Health, Inc. All rights reserved.)

Background: Cognitive and socio-emotional abilities are powerful predictors of death and disease as well as of social and economic outcomes. Education is societies' main way of promoting these abilities, ideally so that inequalities by socioeconomic background are reduced. However, the extent to which education serves these cognitive, social-emotional and equality objectives is relatively unknown and intensively debated. Drawing on a Swedish school reform that was explicitly designed as a massive quasi-experiment, we assessed differential impact of education on intelligence and emotional control across childhood socioeconomic position. We also assessed initial differences in abilities by childhood socioeconomic position and how well childhood socioeconomic position and abilities predict all-cause mortality., Methods: The Swedish comprehensive school reform, rolled out during the 1950s, extended compulsory education from 8 to 9 years in some municipalities whereas others were kept as controls for the sake of evaluation. We followed eight full cohorts of Swedish boys born between 1951 and 1958, who lived in 1017 municipalities with known experimental status (344 336 boys) and whose childhood socioeconomic position was known (320 182 boys). At conscription, intelligence was measured by four subtests and emotional control (calm and efficient responses in various situations) was rated by a military psychologist. Both measures were standardized to have a mean of 100 and standard deviation of 15. All-cause mortality was recorded until 49-56 years of age., Results: The reform had an average positive impact on intelligence of 0.75 IQ units (95% confidence interval (CI): 0.54, 0.97; P < 0.0005). The impact on emotional control was negative; -0.50 units (95% CI: -0.72, -0.28; P < 0.0005). Both effects differed by socioeconomic background so that the average IQ difference between sons of high non-manual and unqualified manual workers was reduced from 16.32 to 15.57 units and the difference in emotional control was reduced from 6.50 to 5.63 units. All-cause mortality was predicted by low childhood socioeconomic position [hazard ratio (HR) = 1.15 [95% CI: 1.11, 1.20], P < 0.0005], low intelligence [HR = 1.39 (95% CI: 1.34, 1.44), P < 0.0005] as well as low emotional control [HR = 1.61 (95% CI: 1.55, 1.67), P < 0.0005] in mutually adjusted models., Conclusions: Extending compulsory education promoted intelligence but lowered emotional control, and reduced disparities over social background in both. Emotional control was the strongest predictor of all-cause mortality. Our results are in line with the idea that education is important in our efforts to achieve healthy, competent and fair societies, but much more work is needed to understand the links between education and non-cognitive skills., (© The Author 2016. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the International Epidemiological Association.)

INTRODUCTION: Loneliness has a rising public health impact, but research involving neuropathology and representative cohorts has been limited. METHODS: Inverse odds of selection weights were generalized from the autopsy sample of Rush Alzheimer's Disease Center cohorts (N = 680; 89 ± 9 years old; 25% dementia) to the US‐representative Health and Retirement Study (N = 8469; 76 ± 7 years old; 5% dementia) to extend external validity. Regressions tested cross‐sectional associations between loneliness and (1) Alzheimer's disease (AD) and cerebrovascular pathology; (2) five cognitive domains; and (3) relationships between pathology and cognition, adjusting for depression. RESULTS: In weighted models, greater loneliness was associated with microinfarcts, lower episodic and working memory in the absence of AD pathology, lower working memory in the absence of infarcts, a stronger association of infarcts with lower episodic memory, and a stronger association of microinfarcts with lower working and semantic memory. DISCUSSION: Loneliness may relate to AD through multiple pathways involving cerebrovascular pathology and cognitive reserve. Highlights: Loneliness was associated with worse cognition in five domains.Loneliness was associated with the presence of microinfarcts.Loneliness moderated cognition–neuropathology associations.Transportability methods can provide insight into selection bias. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives Previous studies on sex differences in cognitive decline provide inconsistent findings, with many European countries being underrepresented. We determined the association between sex and cognitive decline in a sample of Europeans and explored differences across birth cohorts and regions. Methods Participants 50+ years old enrolled in the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe had their cognition measured by tests of immediate recall, delayed recall and verbal fluency biennially up to 17 years of follow-up (median 6, interquartile range 3–9 years). We used linear mixed-effects models to assess the relationship between sex and the rate of cognitive decline, adjusting for sociodemographic and health-related characteristics. Results Of 66,670 participants (mean baseline age 63.5 ± standard deviation 9.4), 55% were female. Males and females had similar rates of decline in the whole sample in immediate recall (beta for interaction sex × time B = 0.002, 95% CI -0.001 to 0.006), delayed recall (B = 0.000, 95% CI −0.004 to 0.004), and verbal fluency (B = 0.008, 95% CI −0.005 to 0.020). Females born before World War II had a faster rate of decline in immediate recall and delayed recall compared to males, while females born during or after World War II had a slower rate of decline in immediate recall. Females in Central and Eastern Europe had a slower rate of cognitive decline in delayed recall compared to males. Discussion Our study does not provide strong evidence of sex differences in cognitive decline among older Europeans. However, we identified heterogeneity across birth cohorts and regions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We leveraged a unique school‐based longitudinal cohort—the Project Talent Aging Study—to examine whether attending higher quality schools is associated with cognitive performance among older adults in the United States (mean age = 74.8). Participants (n = 2,289) completed telephone neurocognitive testing. Six indicators of high school quality, reported by principals at the time of schooling, were predictors of respondents' cognitive function 58 years later. To account for school‐clustering, multilevel linear and logistic models were applied. We found that attending schools with a higher number of teachers with graduate training was the clearest predictor of later‐life cognition, and school quality mattered especially for language abilities. Importantly, Black respondents (n = 239; 10.5 percentage) were disproportionately exposed to low quality high schools. Therefore, increased investment in schools, especially those that serve Black children, could be a powerful strategy to improve later life cognitive health among older adults in the United States. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: Neuropsychology is in a nascent stage of understanding the mechanisms that link social forces, psychosocial experiences, and brain health. Discrimination is associated with lower quality of life, higher stress, and worse physical health outcomes in Latinx, but contradictory findings in prior research complicate our understanding of its relationship to cognition. These contradictory results may be explained by heterogeneity within the broad category of Latinx, a cultural identity that requires more nuanced conceptualization. Immigration status is a primary social identifier for Latinx people that carries significant stigma. However, prior research found enculturation promotes better physical and mental health outcomes in immigrants compared to their US-born counterparts, which may protect immigrant Latinx from the cognitive costs of discrimination. The current study hypothesized that the effect of discrimination on cognition will be stronger in US-born Latinx compared to immigrant Latinx. Participants and Methods: We partnered with 1,023 neurologically healthy, community dwelling Latinx adults (M age=56.1(±10.7); M education=12.5(±3.7); 69% women) in a prospective cohort study in NYC investigating risks factors for Alzheimer's disease. Immigration status was determined by self-report of birthplace. Measures of attention, language, and memory were administered by bilingual examiners in the participants' self-selected preferred language of English (n = 388) or Spanish (n=635). Discrimination, measured with the Everyday Discrimination Scale and Major Experiences of Discrimination Scale, was chronicity coded to weigh experiences of discrimination according to yearly chronicity. Linear regression models were employed for US-born and immigrant participants to assess the relationship between both discrimination measures and each cognitive measure. Results: Compared to US-born Latinx (n = 224), immigrant Latinx (n = 799; primarily from the Dominican Republic) were older, had fewer years of school, had lower income, and were much more likely to have chosen to be assessed in Spanish. Immigrants reported experiencing significantly fewer everyday and major experiences of discrimination than nonimmigrants. In unadjusted models, discrimination did not predict cognitive performance among US-born Latinx. Among immigrant Latinx, more major experiences of discrimination across the lifetime predicted better phonemic (F(2,362) = 4.167, p<0.05, R2=0.017) and semantic fluency (F(2,362) = 3.304, p<0.05, R2=0.013) but was not associated with measures of attention or memory. Conclusions: Discrimination is an important life stressor for Latinx people living in the US, particularly when its impact is summed across intersectional identities. The current study is among the first to explore the potential cognitive impact of discrimination within a group of Latinx adults. The described relationship between discrimination and language performance in this cohort may be confounded by the language in which cognitive tests were administered. Future studies should consider how discrimination measures may be limited in their ability to accurately capture the experiences of US-born and immigrant Latinx groups and expand the measurement of cognition to additional domains. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]