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Background: Cognitive impairment without dementia is associated with increased risk for disability, increased health care costs, and progression to dementia. There are no population-based prevalence estimates of this condition in the United States. Objective: To estimate the prevalence of cognitive impairment without dementia in the United States and determine longitudinal cognitive and mortality outcomes. Design: Longitudinal study from July 2001 to March 2005. Setting: In-home assessment for cognitive impairment. Participants: Participants in ADAMS (Aging, Demographics, and Memory Study) who were age 71 years or older drawn from the nationally representative HRS (Health and Retirement Study). Of 1770 selected individuals, 856 completed initial assessment, and of 241 selected individuals, 180 completed 16- to 18-month follow-up assessment. Measurements: Assessments, including neuropsychological testing, neurologic examination, and clinical and medical history, were used to assign a diagnosis of normal cognition, cognitive impairment without dementia, or dementia. National prevalence rates were estimated by using a population-weighted sample. Results: In 2002, an estimated 5.4 million people (22.2%) in the United States age 71 years or older had cognitive impairment without dementia. Prominent subtypes included prodromal Alzheimer disease (8.2%) and cerebrovascular disease (5.7%). Among participants who completed follow-up assessments, 11.7% with cognitive impairment without dementia progressed to dementia annually, whereas those with subtypes of prodromal Alzheimer disease and stroke progressed at annual rates of 17% to 20%. The annual death rate was 8% among those with cognitive impairment without dementia and almost 15% among those with cognitive impairment due to medical conditions. Limitations: Only 56% of the nondeceased target sample completed the initial assessment. Population sampling weights were derived to adjust for at least some of the potential bias due to nonresponse and attrition. Conclusion: Cognitive impairment without dementia is more prevalent in the United States than dementia, and its subtypes vary in prevalence and outcomes.

The general thesis from which this paper derived is that objective conditions are related to perceptions and evaluations of those conditions, but that such relationships are mediated by personal characteristics such as expectation and aspiration levels, and other motivational factors. The specific relationship examined is that between work status and overall life satisfaction among women. Although there is little difference in average levels of life satisfaction expressed by housewives and by women working outside the home, substantial differences emerge when women are distinguished by their motivation with respect to paid work: among women who want jobs, working women are more satisfied with their lives than are housewives; while among those who would prefer not to work, housewives are more satisfied. Evidence is also found in support of a hypothesis that work tends to be less central to the overall quality of women's lives than is true for men.

Respondents participating in a national quality of life study were asked to assess their levels of satisfaction or dissatisfaction with each of a set of fifteen domains of their lives. They were also asked to describe their lives as a whole, using both satis-faction and semantic-differential types of scales. Canonical correlation analysis was used to find the combinations of domain-specific and global items with the highest correlation. The two indices derived from this analysis, the Index of Well-being and the Index of Domain Satisfactions, have been examined in relation to a variety of demographic and situational variables, including age, indicators of socioeconomic status, employment status, and size of community. The relationships discovered provide some preliminary evidence for the validity of these indices. The reliability of the measures (as measured cross-sectionally) and their stability over a period of some eight months are both acceptably high. We conclude that both of these measures form acceptable indicators of the perceived overall quality of life.

The authors studied the relationship between age and variables measuring satisfactions with specific domains of life as well as global satisfaction and happiness. Data from several large, mostly national, surveys of American adults were utilized. The results showed an increase in satisfaction with housing, community, work, and, somewhat less consistently, with finances/income, standard of living, and leisure/spare time. The increase was less clear for family, marriage, friends, and global well-being. Various explanations for the relationship were tested by multiple regression procedures, using two national surveys. Higher religiosity of the aged, increased desire to respond in a socially acceptable manner, and a lessening of change in life conditions appear to contribute to higher satisfaction. Although these factors individually represent only partial explanations, a combination of them accounts for a substantial part of the relationship. On the other hand, certain aspects of older people's lives are actually worse and, as such, suppress an even more substantial association between age and satisfactions.

The relationships between a set of measures of various components of environmental density and perceived crowding are examined in a data set from a sample of residents of a large metropolitan area. While there are meaningful patterns observed among the correlations, the primary finding is the weakness of the relationships between density and crowding. The implications of the weak relationship between objective and subjective measures intended to measure components of the quality of life, of which the present findings are an example, are discussed; the usefulness of subjective measures may lie primarily in their capacity to define what aspects of society should be monitored and included in a system of social accounting.

This study examined the possible involvement of serum uric acid and serum cholesterol concentrations in the achievement behavior and achievement motivation of male high school students and recent graduates. It attempted to replicate and extend the existing body of data which has suggestively linked serum uric acid and achievement. The cholesterol data were explored as a possible contrast to the correlates of uric acid. The major findings in this part were (1) uric acid showed a positive association with grades and with over-achievement (grades adjusted for intelligence quotient); (2) uric acid was positively related to performance on aptitude (speed) tests; (3) a positive association was obtained between uric acid and the "slope" measure of achievement motivation (steepness of gradient of attractiveness ratings of occupations in relation to their difficulty), and a negative association between uric acid and test anxiety.

The major findings in this part of the study were (1) Students who are attending college, or are definitely planning to attend, had higher uric acid levels, above and beyond the association with high school grades. (2) There was a positive association between uric acid and activities, irrespective of whether they were the recognized extracurricular activities or the informal social and dating behavior. (3) Subjects with low uric acid levels had more unrealistic vocational expectations and perceptions than did subjects with high uric acid levels. (4) Cholesterol clearly showed a different pattern of associations than did uric acid.