Search

Objective Depression is often associated with decreased cognitive performance among older adults. The current study focused on the association of neuropsychological functioning and personality traits in depressed and non-depressed older adults. Methods Data from 75 depressed and 103 non-depressed adults over the age of 60 were analyzed. All participants underwent standardized clinical assessment for depression prior to participation and completed the NEO-PI-R and a series of neuropsychological assessments. Results A series of multiple linear regressions were conducted to examine the relationships between personality and neuropsychological performance among depressed and non-depressed older adults. Results indicated that higher Openness to Experience was related to better performance on Parts A and B of the Trail Making Test among depressed older adults, and to better Digit Span Backward performance among all participants. Higher levels of neuroticism were related to poorer performance on Digit Span Backward, but only among depressed older adults. Depressed participants performed more poorly on the Symbol Digit Modalities Test and the Controlled Oral Word Association Test. Conclusions Personality characteristics, particularly Openness to Experience, modified the relationship between depression and neuropsychological functioning among older adults. Results indicate that interventions aimed at increasing one's Openness to Experience could potentially attenuate some of the neuropsychological impairments that are associated with depression. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

OBJECTIVES: To examine the performance subjects with and without mild cognitive impairment (MCI) on an objective measure of everyday or real-world memory and subjective items assessing competency within the same instrumental domains; to determine whether the Everyday Cognition Battery (ECB) can uniquely predict MCI status. DESIGN: Cross-sectional. SETTING: Independent-living sample of urban dwelling elders in Baltimore Maryland. PARTICIPANTS: The sample consisted of 555 subjects ranging in age from 50 to 95 (mean 68.8 ± 9.6). MEASUREMENTS: Objective performance in three instrumental domains (medication use, financial management, nutrition and food preparation) was assessed using the ECB Memory Test. Subjective performance within the same instrumental domains was also assessed. RESULTS: No difference was found between elderly subjects with and without MCI on the subjective items of instrumental activity of daily living (IADL) competency. A significant multivariate effect for cognitive status group (F3, 507=21.88, P<.05, η2=.12) was observed for the objective measure, with participants with MCI performing, on average, significantly worse than those without on all thee instrumental domain subscales. The medicine use (odds ratio (OR)=0.96, 95% confidence interval (CI)=0.94–0.99) and financial management (OR=0.93, 95% CI=0.91–0.96) subscales of the ECB Memory Test were unique and significant predictors of MCI. CONCLUSION: This study adds to the growing body of literature suggesting that cognitively complex IADLs might be compromised in elderly people with MCI. Moreover, the ECB Memory Test might be a clinically useful tool in evaluating real-world competency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]