Funcionamiento cognitivo en personas mayores e influencia de variables socioeducativas - Resultados del Estudio ELES

Abstract

El funcionamiento cognitivo experimenta cambios en las personas mayores. El grado de declive no es el mismo en todas las funciones cognitivas y otras variables, como el nivel educativo o el desempeño profesional a lo largo del ciclo vital, pueden hacer que dicho declive sea más lento. El objetivo del presente estudio es el de conocer el patrón de rendimiento cognitivo de las personas mayores de 50 años, teniendo en cuenta la influencia del nivel educativo y de la profesión. Los datos de esta investigación provienen del estudio piloto desarrollado en el Estudio Longitudinal Envejecer en España en el que se evaluó a una muestra representativa de la población española mayor no institucionalizada. Dentro del rendimiento cognitivo se evaluó el funcionamiento cognitivo global, la memoria verbal, la amplitud de memoria de trabajo, la velocidad viso-motora y el lenguaje. Se encontraron diferencias entre los grupos de edad en todas las variables. También se encontraron diferencias en los grupos según el nivel educativo y el tipo de profesión, que se mantenían al controlar la edad. Los estudios poblacionales permiten una perspectiva más global del rendimiento cognitivo de las personas mayores, así como del papel de los diferentes factores asociados al mismo.Palabras clave: Funcionamiento Cognitivo; Estudio ELES; Nivel Educativo; Profesión.Cognitive functioning changes in elderly people. The degree of decline varies across different cognitive abilities and other variables, such as educational level and life-time professional activity, can slow down this process. This study investigates the pattern of cognitive performance in people over 50 years old, taking into account the influence of educational level and profession. Research data were collected during the pilot study of the Longitudinal Aging Study in Spain (ELES) in which a representative sample of non-institutionalized Spanish older people was assessed.The following cognitive variables were evaluated: general cognitive functioning, verbal memory, working memory span, visuomotor speed, and language. Differences were found in all cognitive variables in the different age groups, and according to educational level and profession. These differences remained after controlling for the age variable.Population studies provide a global perspective of cognitive performance in older people and help to identify the role of the different associated factors. Cognitive functioning in elderly people and the influence of the socio-educative variables -Results from the ELES Study

Factors that indicate performance on the MoCA 7.3 in healthy adults over 50 years old

“…Regarding the first aim of this study, we establish gender-related differences in total MoCA test performance, as well as a negative association between the total MoCA test performance with age and severity of depressive symptoms, and a positive relationship with years of schooling. Our findings are in line with other works that report differences based on gender [ 13 , 14 ] age [ 12 ], depression symptoms [ 17 , 18 , 20 ], and years of schooling [ 26 , 27 ].…”

“…Cognitive deterioration is not general and homogeneous among the affected individuals; in fact, it has been shown that people with higher level of education show better cognitive performance at old age, which confirms the effect of the variables associated with cognitive reserve in the maintenance of cognitive functioning in adulthood [ 26 , 27 ]. Similarly, education has been described to be a protective element against cognitive deterioration, associated with the amount of cognitive loss required for the appearance of symptoms [ 28 ].…”

Impact of Educational Level on Versions (Basic and Complete) of the Montreal Cognitive Assessment

“…The levels of variance explained by these variables in the current study (MoCA Basic = 31.8% and MoCA Full = 33.8%) were somewhat lower than those found by Freitas et al [28] with a Portuguese population, who found age and education explained 49% of the variance in MoCA Full scores. Results from this study are also consistent with several studies indicating that the total MoCA score consistently increases with educational level and decreases with advancing age [23,36,[49][50][51][52]. Rossetti et al [32] found, in a North American population, that performance decreases to a lesser extent with age in those participants with 12 years of education, and more in those with less education.…”

“…The relationship between educational level and cognitive performance may be explained in part by a higher prevalence of healthy behaviors in more educated people, such as better nutrition, greater physical and mental activity, greater autonomy at the work level, etc. [31, 51, 52]. If true, this relationship could indicate that the mentioned variables are protective factors for cognitive impairment, and therefore result in better performance in cognitive assessment instruments in adults.…”

Factores predictores de deterioro cognitivo en población mayor de 64 años institucionalizada y no institucionalizada

“…Al analizar los datos según la edad, se observó en ambos grupos que las puntuaciones de todas las áreas cognitivas experimentaban un descenso de forma significativa conforme aumentaba la edad, mostrando estos resultados consistencia con los hallazgos de otros estudios 22 . Con respecto al sexo hallamos asociación con el DC dentro de la institución, con mayor prevalencia en mujeres, no existiendo grandes diferencias de sexo fuera de la institución.…”