Cognitive Psychology Commons^™

Cognitive Differences In Parkinson’S Disease With Amyloid Positivity And Negativity, Kenya Luna

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

In Parkinson’s Disease (PD), research has shifted to investigate how biomarkers commonly seen in Alzheimer’s Disease (AD), such as amyloid beta (AB), may be associated with cognitive functioning in PD. AB is considered a reliable biomarker for AD pathology, however in PD there is a lacking biomarker that can accurately reflect severity of cognitive impairment. AD research has shown an association between low AB and cognitive decline, but the data in PD has mixed results. Most studies that analyze cognitive decline and biomarkers do not use a cutoff level and the few that do have a threshold vary greatly in …

An Examination Of The Relation Between Memory Self-Efficacy And Working Memory Within The Cognitive Reserve Framework, Genna Marie Mashinchi Ma

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Dementia has been found to negatively affect multiple aspects of cognitive functioning. Despite an increasing prevalence of cognitive decline, many aging adults do not experience reduced cognitive functioning. The reason as to why some experience cognitive decline and others do not is still unclear. One leading theory thought to explain this phenomenon is the cognitive reserve theory (CR), which proposes that certain lifestyle factors (e.g., educational attainment, occupational attainment, and leisure activity participation) prolong one’s cognitive functioning and reduce the risk of cognitive decline. Memory self-efficacy (MSE), defined as one’s beliefs in their memory ability, was found to be positively …

Assessing The Correlation Between The Socioeconomic Level And Cognitive Function Among Older Adults In Egypt, Macy Abougabal

Theses and Dissertations

The number of older adults is increasing worldwide at an unprecedented rate. Some countries began to understand the challenges of aging, while others are still at the stage of comprehending the true dimensions of the situation. There is a global focus on aging research to appropriately mitigate the negative impact of aging and cognitive decline. Not only that dementia add economic pressure on governments, it also increase the psychological and physical burden of the caregivers. Scholars have previously studied socioeconomic level in three variables, namely work, education, and income, and their relationship with cognitive function. It was concluded that the …

Neuroanatomy In Mild Cognitive Impairment: Relationship To Functional Skills, Treatment Expectancy, And Comorbid Depression, Sara Rushia

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Mild cognitive impairment (MCI) is a neurocognitive disorder defined by cognitive decline in older adults. Although MCI has been studied for decades, there remain important areas to be explored in order to adequately characterize aspects of this disorder that provide information valuable for possible interventions and disease progression to dementia, including a better understanding of the neuroanatomical variables relevant to this disorder. Such neuroanatomical variables include cortical thickness, hippocampal volume, and white matter hyperintensities (WMHs). This dissertation consists of three separate studies aimed at addressing gaps in the literature on MCI in relation to brain morphometrics and under-studied characteristics involved …

Methodological Considerations For The Study Of Cognitive Reserve And Its Relationship To Cognitive Decline In Older Adults, Kerry A. Howard

All Dissertations

Cognitive reserve (CR) is a key construct in promoting healthy cognitive aging. Methodological inconsistencies have limited the ability for researchers to make broad conclusions about relevant life experiences that may build CR and delay cognitive decline. This dissertation explored notable issues within the operationalization of CR based on proxy life experiences by applying a systematic approach toward understanding the use of CR, as well as an understanding of consequences of inconsistent operationalization. The project had three aims: review and explore the association between various CR proxies utilized in the literature and develop a composite score for CR, describe differences in …

Neural Markers Of Musical Memory In Young And Older Adults, Avital Sternin

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Memory for music can be preserved in the presence of neurodegenerative disorders even when other memories are forgotten. However, understanding how the brain remembers music has proven difficult despite decades of research. The central goal of this thesis was to elucidate the neural correlates of musical memory by exploring how the presence of language and music information affect the way young and older adults remember music. To that end, I 1) used a controlled training paradigm to familiarize participants with novel stimuli that manipulated the presence of language and music, and 2) collected functional magnetic resonance imaging data to compare …

Exploring The Mechanisms That Underlie The Benefits Of Retrieval Practice In Younger And Older Adults, Ruth A. Shaffer

Arts & Sciences Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The testing effect—or the benefit of retrieval practice to later memory—is often considered to be a recollection-related phenomenon. However, recent work (Shaffer & McDermott, 2020) has observed a benefit of testing to both recollection and familiarity processing on both immediate and delayed final tests. Further, although aging populations show marked declines in recollection, older and younger adults often benefit from testing to a similar degree (Meyer & Logan, 2013). This finding suggests that the testing effect in older adults may function via relatively preserved familiarity and lends further support to the notion that the testing effect does not function solely …

To Examine The Effects Of Exercise & Instructional Based Interventions On Executive Functioning, Motor Learning & Emotional Intelligence Abilities Among Older Adults, Lavanya Rajesh Kumar

Dissertations, Master's Theses and Master's Reports

Motor skills are a vital part of our life, and there might be situations where we will be required to either learn a new skill or relearn a known one. We examined the effectiveness of two different interventions - eccentric exercise and motivation-based instructions on enhancing the ability of older adults to learn a novel motor skill. Exercise intervention studies have shown that as little as 12 weeks of exercise can lead to improvements in both physical fitness and cognitive function in older adults, particularly executive control. But it is still unclear whether those improvements translate to improvements in other …

The Biological, Psychological, Cognitive, And Social Perspectives On Aging: The Design Of A Healthy Aging Program For Older Adults, Melissa Santiago

Dissertations

Aging is an inevitable process, accompanied by changes in physiological, cognitive, psychological, and social facets. Researchers have investigated the physiological, cognitive, psychological, and social risk factors associated with aging and have encouraged the use of physical activity, cognitive training, and dietary interventions to alleviate risk factors. However, holistic programs dedicated to promoting successful aging among older adults are uncommon. This review sought to promote successful aging by identifying physiological, cognitive, psychological, and social risk factors that affect older adults and develop a comprehensive program to holistically mitigate these risk factors. Risk factors associated with unsuccessful aging include the development of …

Off-Topic Verbosity And Sustained Attention Among Young Adult And Older Adult Age Cohorts, Jessica H. Helphrey

Psychology and Counseling Theses

Off-topic verbosity (OTV) is tangential discourse with excessive and irrelevant information. Older adults have been historically labeled as having high OTV, and research has suggested that high OTV in older adults may be linked with cognitive decline. While past studies have utilized brief cognitive measures to further expound upon the links between cognition and OTV, studies have lacked consistency and lengthy measures. This study sought to elucidate the relationship between OTV and cognition in both older adult and young adult age cohorts utilizing a sustained attention measure. Young adults (n = 61; age range: 18-28, M = 20.57, SD = …

Quality Of Sleep, Stress, And Exercise: Effects Of Environmental And Lifestyle Factors On Spatial Navigation In Older Adults, Hannah Maybrier

Arts & Sciences Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Introduction: With increasing age, many adults experience reduced spatial navigation ability, with the most prominent reductions in tasks dependent on the hippocampus. Hippocampal dysfunction may be linked to age-related increases in sleep fragmentation, which results in reduced neurogenesis and long-term potentiation. This project aims to determine if age-related reductions in hippocampal-dependent navigation ability and strategy selection are mediated by impaired sleep. Further, we propose that the effects of sleep on navigation are moderated by psychological stress and physical activity. Methods: 36 older (m: 70, sd: 7) and 33 younger (m: 20, sd: 1.5) adults recorded one week of sleep via …

How Specific Is Domain-Specific Slowing? Evidence For A General Form Of A Domain-Specific Mechanism, Cynthia C. Flores

Arts & Sciences Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Faces are special not just because our ability to quickly and accurately process faces is integral for social functioning throughout our lives, but also because faces are considered a unique class of visual stimuli (i.e., faces rely more on holistic processing than objects and there exist specialized, face-specific regions in the brain). Behavioral and neuropsychological research point to face processing as dissociable from other kinds of visuospatial processing. Although there is evidence that neural specificity for faces is retained in older adults, there is also evidence that age-related impairments are greater in face processing, relative to object processing. Using a …

Dissociable Effects Of Monetary, Liquid, And Social Incentives On Motivation Across The Adult Life Span, Jennifer Crawford

Arts & Sciences Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Humans are social creatures and, as such, can be motivated by aspects of social life, like approval from others, to guide decision-making in everyday life. Indeed, a common view in the aging literature is that older adults have a stronger orientation towards socioemotional goals or incentives, relative to other incentive modalities, like money, because of changing motivational priorities in older adulthood. In prior work, however, we found that older adults actually showed greater effects of monetary relative to primary (liquid) incentives, suggesting alternative interpretations of impaired motivational integration and/or slower adaptation to incentive conditions. The current study tested these alternatives, …

Home-Based Cognitive Monitoring: The Role Of Personality And Predictors Of Adherence And Satisfaction, Nasreen A. Sadeq

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Over the last several decades, a growing awareness of the benefits of regular screening for common health conditions, such as cancer and cardiovascular diseases, has paved the way for preventative screenings to become routine in medical settings. Given that cognitive impairment is frequently reported as the number one worry of older adults, home-based cognitive monitoring may be an innovative solution that allows middle aged and older adults to take an active role in monitoring an important aspect of their health. Although several home-based cognitive monitoring programs have been validated for use in clinical and home-based settings, the Cogstate Brief Battery …

The Revelation Effect In Autobiographical Memory, Vincent A. Medina

Seton Hall University Dissertations and Theses (ETDs)

The revelation effect is a memory illusion in recognition memory where items are more likely to be considered old if they are immediately preceded by a cognitive task (for a review, see Abfalg, Bernstein, & Hockley, 2017). Recent research has shown that the revelation effect appears in past and future episodic judgments so long as the tasks are autobiographical in nature (Westerman, Miller, & Lloyd, 2017). Aging is a factor that has not yet been studied in the revelation effect literature in terms of autobiographical memory. It has implications because of aging’s significant impact on mental time travel. During this …

Exploring Age-Related Metamemory Differences Using Modified Brier Scores And Hierarchical Clustering, Chelsea Parlett

Computational and Data Sciences (MS) Theses

Older adults (OAs) typically experience memory failures as they age. However, with some exceptions, studies of OAs’ ability to assess their own memory functions– Metamemory (MM)– find little evidence that this function is susceptible to age-related decline. Our study examines OAs’ and young adults’ (YAs) MM performance and strategy use. Groups of YAs (N = 138) and OAs (N = 79) performed a MM task that required participants to place bets on how likely they were to remember words in a list. Our analytical approach includes hierarchical clustering, and we introduce a new measure of MM—the modified Brier—in order to …

Manipulating Belief Bias Across The Lifespan, William D. Carney

Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects

In today’s political climate, when basic facts and reasoning are seemingly up for debate, it is increasingly important to be able to identify well-reasoned arguments, regardless of one’s political leanings, and to retain this skill throughout the lifespan. Research has shown, however, a persistent belief bias—a tendency to judge an argument’s validity based on its conclusion’s agreement with one’s beliefs, rather than its logical quality. Other findings suggest that belief bias can be reduced by instruction to avoid belief bias. The current project seeks to explore whether older adults, believed to be more prone to biased reasoning, respond differently to …

Exercise Engagement And Longitudinal Change In Alzheimer's Disease Biomarkers, Regional Brain Structure, And Cognitive Functioning, Marta Stojanovic

Arts & Sciences Electronic Theses and Dissertations

No abstract provided.

The Consequences Of Processing Of Goal-Irrelevant Information During The Stroop Task In Younger And Older Adults, Jessica Nicosia

Arts & Sciences Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Recent evidence from memory paradigms indicates that older adults can sometimes benefit more from processing goal-irrelevant information than younger adults, however these studies have often failed to simultaneously provide evidence of age-related control deficits. In the present experiments, participants initially studied a list of words. They then received a color-naming Stroop task where neutral words were either previously studied or new words. Across three experiments, participants were given different types of memory tests to examine the lingering effects of the neutral words during color-naming in younger and older adults. The results from all three experiments (including an attempted replication study) …

Gene-Environment Interaction: Brain-Derived Neurotrophic Factor (Bdnf) As A Moderating Factor For The Effects Of Exercise And Diet On Cognitive And Mental Health: The Cache County Study On Memory In Aging, Chelsea L. Sanders

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

The Cache County Study on Memory in Aging, funded by the National Institute on Aging, studied longitudinal changes in memory and aging over 12 years’ follow-up in a population-based sample of 5,092 older adults in semirural Cache County, UT. Among the extensive interview procedures, researchers collected information regarding the participants’ demographics, health, genetic factors, diet, physical activity, and cognitive abilities. This study has allowed researchers to investigate how genetic and modifiable lifestyle factors interact to predict health, cognitive function, and psychological wellbeing in older adults.

Diet and exercise are important lifestyle factors in maintaining cognitive health and psychological wellbeing throughout …

Just Don't Do It!: A Comparison Of Strategies For Reducing Commission Errors In Older And Younger Adults, Emily Streeper

Arts & Sciences Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Prospective memory (PM) commission errors occur when an individual erroneously repeats an intention that is finished and therefore no longer relevant (e.g., accidentally taking a medication one no longer needs to take). Commission errors have been observed in younger and older adults with age exacerbating commission error risk in select conditions. Only one prior study has used the finished paradigm to investigate the use of explicit strategies to reduce commission error rates in older adults. Bugg, Scullin, and Rauvola (2016) found that forgetting practice, an experience-based strategy, minimized commission errors to floor levels but a preparation-based strategy was ineffective. The …

Assessment For Mild Cognitive Impairment: Striving For Best Practice, Julie Leigh Dalmasso

Dissertations

This dissertation is a series of three studies aimed at determining the best assessment practices for mild cognitive impairment (MCI) that can employed by speech-language pathologists (SLPs). The first study was non-experimental and descriptive examining whether three commonly used assessment instruments yielded similar categorical results. The data were analyzed to determine whether the Eight-Item Interview to Differentiate Aging and Dementia (AD8), the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE), and the Cognitive-Linguistic Quick Test (CLQT) identified the same participants from a neurotypical sample as having cognitive deficits. Very little agreement was found amongst the three tools.

Study two was modified to include two …

Recognition Memory Revisited: An Aging And Electrophysiological Investigation, Elliot C. Jardin

ETD Archive

This study provides a better understanding of contributing factors to age differences in human episodic memory. A recurrent finding in recognition memory is that older adults tend to have lower overall accuracy and tend to make fewer false-alarm errors in judging new items, relative miss errors (Coyne, Allen & Wickens, 1986; Danziger, 1980; Poon and Fozard 1980). Two possible causes for decline in these abilities include an age-related decrement in speed of processing (Salthouse 1991) and changes in information processing ability due to entropy (Allen, Kaufman, Smitch, & Propper 1998a; Mallik et al., in preparation). Additionally, age differences may be …

Dynamic Balance Control And Segmental Orientation While Listening During Walking: Effects Of Age And Hearing Loss, Sin Tung Lau

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

Dynamic control of balance changes with age and changes with declines in sensory and cognitive abilities. For instance, emerging, yet robust associations between hearing loss and poor mobility have been described and yet the mechanism underlying these associations remains unknown. It could be that age-related declines in hearing ability result in different kinematic strategies when having to walk and listen at the same time (e.g. head and body orienting responses toward sounds) and/or that declines in hearing result in increased cognitive load during listening, at the detriment to mobility-related performance. Therefore, this thesis sought to better characterize these associations by …

Prospective Associations Of Homocysteine, Executive Function, And Depressive Symptoms, Peter J. Dearborn

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Associations of cardiovascular risk factors, cognitive performance, and depressive symptoms have been well established. However, the directionality of these associations as well as the specificity of these associations with respect to executive function are less clear. Additionally few studies have determined whether genetic risk factors, such as apolipoprotein-E4 (APOE-E4) genotype, and age moderate the associations of cardiovascular risk factors such as homocysteine with changes in depressive symptoms and how these associations may be mediated by cognitive performance. The primary aim of this study was to analyze the bidirectional associations of a full range of cognitive domains and symptoms of depression …

Life-Long Creativity: Changing The Narrative Of Aging And Retirement, Jennifer K. Gippel Dr

Creativity and Change Leadership Graduate Student Master's Projects

The current narratives and stereotypes around retirement and aging are both inaccurate and incomplete. The popular media regularly portrays retirees and older citizens as blissfully happy but bland; or physically feeble and forgetful. Rarely are they portrayed as achievers and vibrant problem solvers. Instead they are perceived by policy makers as a problem to be solved. This project offers a different narrative ― one that presents retirement and aging as a unique time of creative opportunity, possibility, and freedom to choose. The primary outcome of the project is two chapters of a book entitled: Retirement by design: How to discover …

Age-Related Changes In Visual Spatial Performance, Samantha Farrell

Seton Hall University Dissertations and Theses (ETDs)

Visual spatial skills allow individuals to understand the relationship between objects, people, and the environment for their everyday activities. Visual spatial abilities incorporate visual, motor, and cognitive components, each of which changes across the lifespan. The current study examined the effects of age-related changes and practice type on visual spatial performance. Participants between 40 and 79 years of age were asked to complete the Block Design Task (BDT) by using nine blocks to recreate various designs. Both accuracy and latency were measured to examine these changes. Task difficulty and practice type were varied and cognitive abilities were measured via MMSE …

Process Dissociation Analyses Of Memory Changes In Healthy Aging, Preclinical, And Very Mild Alzheimer Disease: Evidence For Isolated Recollection Deficits, Peter R. Millar

Arts & Sciences Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Recollection and familiarity are independent processes that contribute to memory performance. Recollection is dependent on attentional control, which breaks down in early-stage Alzheimer disease (AD), whereas familiarity is independent of attention. The present study examines the sensitivity of recollection estimates based on Jacoby’s (1991) process dissociation procedure to AD-related biomarkers in a large sample of well-characterized cognitively normal older adults (N = 519) and the extent to which recollection discriminates these individuals from individuals with very mild symptomatic AD (N = 64). Participants studied word pairs, e.g., “knee bone,” then completed a primed, explicit, cued fragment-completion memory task, e.g., “knee …

Intraindividual Variability As A Predictor Of Cognitive Decline In Elderly, Wendy S. Ramratan

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Mild cognitive impairment (MCI) is conceptualized as a transitional state between normal aging and fully developed clinical features of dementia. The literature on MCI is notable for varied measurement approaches and lack of stability in the diagnostic entity, with many individuals remaining stable or reverting to normal cognitive status. Researchers agree that multiple neuropsychological domains should be assessed to enhance the assessment and prediction of cognitive decline. In addition, within-person assessments capture trajectories of decline, which are better suited for understanding individual change than simple comparison to group norms. The current study investigated the ability of within-person change on novel …

Category Learning In Older Adulthood: Understanding And Reducing Age-Related Deficits, Rahel R. Rabi

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Executive functions are important for learning rule-based (RB) categories, as well as non-rule-based (NRB) categories (e.g., categories learned implicitly, without a verbal rule). However, executive functioning is known to decline with age, leading to age-related deficits in category learning. The current thesis examines RB and NRB category learning in older adults using category sets that vary in difficulty (e.g., rule complexity, number of stimulus dimensions, salience of stimulus dimensions). In Chapter 2, older adults and younger adults completed three category sets (simple single-dimensional RB, disjunctive RB, and NRB). Older adults learned the simple, single-dimensional rules quite well. In contrast to …