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Introduction: This study aimed to investigate the age trends in various types of memory, including priming, working memory (WM), episodic memory (EM), and semantic memory (SM) from adulthood to old age, as well as the mediating role of inhibition control (IC) in the relationship between age and memory. Methods: A total of 796 healthy adults aged between 25 and 83 years participated in this cross-sectional study. They underwent assessment using a comprehensive battery of memory tests (adapted from the Betula battery), digit span tasks (to measure WM), and the Stroop colorword test (to measure IC). Results: The scatter plot with locally estimated scatterplot smoothing (LOESS) fitting line showed EM and WM declined steadily from age 25, while SM exhibited a mild increase up to age 55 followed by a decline. Priming did not show significant changes with age. Mediation analysis and bootstrap tests indicated that IC mediated the relationship between age and EM (beta=-0.097, P=0.002) and between age and SM (beta=-0.086, P=0.001). Conclusion: Our results showed that age affects various types of memory differently, and inhibition control plays a fundamental mediating role in explaining age-related declines in SM and EM., Funding agency:Cognitive Science and Technologies Council of Iran

The neurobiological underpinnings of action-related episodic memory and how enactment contributes to efficient memory encoding are not well understood. We examine whether individual differences in level (n = 338) and 5-year change (n = 248) in the ability to benefit from motor involvement during memory encoding are related to gray matter (GM) volume, white matter (WM) integrity, and dopamine-regulating genes in a population-based cohort (age range = 25-80 years). A latent profile analysis identified 2 groups with similar performance on verbal encoding but with marked differences in the ability to benefit from motor involvement during memory encoding. Impaired ability to benefit from enactment was paired with smaller HC, parahippocampal, and putamen volume along with lower WM microstructure in the fornix. Individuals with reduced ability to benefit from encoding enactment over 5 years were characterized by reduced HC and motor cortex GM volume along with reduced WM microstructure in several WM tracts. Moreover, the proportion of catechol-O-methyltransferase-Val-carriers differed significantly between classes identified from the latent-profile analysis. These results provide converging evidence that individuals with low or declining ability to benefit from motor involvement during memory encoding are characterized by low and reduced GM volume in regions critical for memory and motor functions along with altered WM microstructure.

The neurobiological underpinnings of action-related episodic memory and how enactment contributes to efficient memory encoding are not well understood. We examine whether individual differences in level (n = 338) and 5-year change (n = 248) in the ability to benefit from motor involvement during memory encoding are related to gray matter (GM) volume, white matter (WM) integrity, and dopamine-regulating genes in a population-based cohort (age range = 25–80 years). A latent profile analysis identified 2 groups with similar performance on verbal encoding but with marked differences in the ability to benefit from motor involvement during memory encoding. Impaired ability to benefit from enactment was paired with smaller HC, parahippocampal, and putamen volume along with lower WM microstructure in the fornix. Individuals with reduced ability to benefit from encoding enactment over 5 years were characterized by reduced HC and motor cortex GM volume along with reduced WM microstructure in several WM tracts. Moreover, the proportion of catechol-O-methyltransferase-Val-carriers differed significantly between classes identified from the latent-profile analysis. These results provide converging evidence that individuals with low or declining ability to benefit from motor involvement during memory encoding are characterized by low and reduced GM volume in regions critical for memory and motor functions along with altered WM microstructure.

OBJECTIVE: The main aim of the present study is to investigate the association between different measures of cognitive reserve including bilingualism, mental activities, type of education (continuous versus distributed), age, educational level, and episodic memory in a healthy aging sample. METHODS: Four hundred and fifteen participants aged between 50 and 83 years participated in this cross-sectional study and were assessed with the Psychology Experimental Building Language Test battery tapping episodic memory. Demographic variables were collected from a questionnaire designed by the research team. RESULTS: Compared to participants with continuous type of education, those with distributed type performed better in tests of episodic memory, while no differences were found between bilingual and monolingual participants. We additionally found that age negatively predicts episodic memory, whereas playing mind teasers and educational level have positive relationships with episodic memory. CONCLUSIONS: Our results indicate that higher cognitive reserve, as measured by distributed educational training, higher level of education, and doing regular mental activities, is associated with better performance on episodic memory tasks in older adults. These results were discussed in connection with successful aging and protection against memory decline with aging., Funding Agency:CSTC of Iran

Background: Population aging motivated a focus in contemporary research on factors, e.g. cognitive functioning, that contribute to ‘aging well.’ However, something that has been overlooked is relation between memory functioning, determined by objective tests as well as subjective memory ratings, and subjective well-being (SWB). Objectives: The aim of the present study was to investigate cross-sectional and longitudinal (cross-lagged) relationships between episodic memory (both subjective and objective) and SWB. Method: A total of 586 older individuals (60–90 years) were assessed on multiple measures of the targeted constructs at baseline (Time 1) as part of the Betula cohort study. Five years later (Time 2), 354 of the participants returned for follow-up measurements and were included in cross-lagged panel analyses. Results: As expected, objective memory and subjective memory showed a pattern of cross-sectional age deficits and a mean level longitudinal decline was observed for objective memory. By contrast, SWB showed stable mean levels both across age and time. No cross-sectional or cross-lagged associations were observed between SWB and objective memory, whereas subjective memory and SWB showed a cross-sectional association. Conclusion: The results underscore that successful aging is a multifaceted construct with no or only weak associations between the investigated components. However, SWB and rate of change at the individual level should be considered to define successful aging.

Background: The brief version of community screening instrument for dementia (CSI-D) is a neuropsychological tool, which can be used even by non-specialists in primary care settings following a short training. The CSI-D evaluates the cognitive and functional domains of the subjects and includes an informant interview. However, it should be adapted based on literacy level and sociocultural profile of population in each country. Objectives: The current study examined the validity and reliability of the Persian version of the brief CSI-D in elderly patients of Iran. Methods: The current descriptive, cross sectional study was conducted on people 60 and over from 16 provinces of Iran with seven different ethnicities and various levels of education (0 - 13 to >= 13 years). The participants consisted of subjects with normal cognition, subjective cognitive impairment (SCI), mild cognitive impairment (MCI), and different types of dementia. Cognitive impairment was diagnosed by a neurologist with expertise in dementia. The psychometric properties were assessed by comparing Persian version of brief CSI-D with the gold standard. Area under ROC curve, optimal cutoff point, and sensitivity and specificity were also calculated. Results: Data were collected from 262 participants. Of all the participants, 112 were diagnosed with dementia, 64 with MCI, 32 with SCI, and 53 with normal cognition. The best cutoff point for the test-regardless of gender and level of education-was 8.5 compared with 8 - 9 in the original version of CSI-D and also the cutoff point for patient with dementia was 5.5, while it was 4 in the original version. Conclusions: The Persian version of CSI-D seems to be an accurate and sensitive tool to screen dementia and MCI in primary care setting, especially among low-educated and illiterate people.

BACKGROUND: The relationship between conscientiousness, mental health and mental illness has been an issue for the last two decades. AIMS: By using a dual model of mental health, the present study examined a non-linear relationship between conscientiousness and healthy or non-healthy symptoms in two different cultures. METHOD: Participants in this study were 296 Iranian and 310 Swedish university students (18-24 years of age). We used two different conscientiousness scales; the 12-item conscientiousness subscale of the NEO/FFI as an imported (etic) scale, and a 10-item Iranian conscientiousness scale as an indigenous (emic) and culture-dependent scale. RESULTS: In both conscientiousness scales, multivariate analysis of variance showed that conscientiousness differentiated among four mental health groups (languishing, troubled, symptomatic and flourishing), although languishing and troubled individuals were less conscientious than flourishing and symptomatic individuals. Furthermore, the non-healthy symptomatic individuals were more conscientiousness than flourishing individuals. The results showed no significant differences between the two cultures in terms of the four mental health categories. CONCLUSIONS: It was concluded that the relationship between conscientiousness and mental health/mental illness is more a non-linear relationship than a linear one.

Research in action memory for adults has shown that enacted encoding is not only retrieved more frequently but is also faster in comparison to verbal encoding. The aim of this study was to investigate retrieval processes in terms of recall period and recall difficulty for different encoding conditions in school-aged children (8-, 10-, 12-, 14-years old). The participants studied verbal tasks, subject-performed tasks and experimenter-performed tasks, and received immediate and final free-recall tests. The results revealed that older children not only outperformed younger children in terms of accuracy but also outpaced them in all recall periods. Moreover, recalls of subject-performed tasks and experimenter-performed tasks were better and faster compared with verbal encoding on both types of recall test, by increasing throughout the recall periods. These results are discussed in terms of memory strategies and information processing methods. Pedagogic implications for the use of action memory in children's learning are also considered.

There is a lack of free software that provides a professional and smooth experience in text editing and markup for qualitative data analysis. Word processing software like Microsoft Word provides a good editing experience, allowing the researcher to effortlessly add comments to text portions. However, organizing the keywords and categories in the comments can become a more difficult task when the amount of data increases. We present WordCommentsAnalyzer, a software tool that is written in C# using .NET Framework and OpenXml, which helps a qualitative researcher to organize codes when using Microsoft Word as the primary text markup software. WordCommentsAnalyzer provides an effective user interface to count codes, to organize codes in a code hierarchy, and to see various data extracts belonging to each code. It also offers basic visualization tools. We illustrate how to use this software by conducting a preliminary content analysis on Tweets with the #successfulaging hashtag. We also demonstrate that the software has satisfactory performance on a large dataset of Iranian journals abstracts. We hope this open-source software will facilitate qualitative data analysis by researchers who are interested in using Word for this purpose.

The aim of this study was to examine action memory as a form of episodic memory among school-aged subjects. Most research on action memory has focused on memory changes in adult populations. This study explored the action memory of children over time. A total of 410 school-aged child participants, comprising 201 girls and 208 boys in four age groups (8, 10, 12, 14), were included in this study. We studied two forms of action encoding, subject-performed tasks (SPTs) and experimenter-performed tasks (EPTs), which were compared with one verbal encoding task as a control condition. At retrieval, we used three memory tests (free recall, cued recall, and recognition). We observed significant differences in memory performance in children aged 8-14 years with respect to free recall and cued recall but not recognition. The largest memory enhancement was observed for the SPTs in the 8-14-year-old participants under all test conditions. Participants performed equally well on the free recall of SPTs and EPTs, whereas they displayed better performances on the cued recall and recognition of SPTs compared to EPTs. The strategic nature of SPTs and the distinction between item-specific information and relational information are discussed.

This study was designed to investigate the effect of bilingualism and reading difficulties (RD) on episodic and semantic memory. The subjects included 190 children (aged 9–12 years): 45 Iranian-Swedish bilinguals and 59 Swedish monolinguals with typically developed reading, along with 41 bilinguals and 45 monolinguals with RD. To measure episodic memory, subject-performed and verbal tasks were used for encoding, and both free and cued recall were used for retrieval. Letter and category fluency tasks were used to test semantic memory. In action memory, bilingual children with RD benefited less from enactment encoding form compared to children with typically developed reading. Additionally, bilingual with RD had lower rates of recollection in category fluency compared to their monolingual counterparts. However, in letter fluency, there was not found a difference between performances of bilinguals and monolinguals with RD. We discuss the involvement of long-term memory in both bilingualism and reading.

Memory works better when we have hands on experience with learning materials. In a same way, children remember action phrases better if they are instructed to enact it rather than when they only read it or watch someone else do it. We investigated this enactment effect in different grades´ children in order to find out the developmental pattern of differences. In this study, we first tried to replicate typical enactment effect in children. Then, we compared memory in subject-performed tasks, experimenter-performed tasks and verbal tasks using three memory tests (free recall, cued recall, and recognition) in children. Four hundred and ten pupils from four grades (2nd, 4th, 6th, and 8th) participated in the study. The results showed that first, there is an enactment effect in school-aged children as well as in adults. Second, the encoding conditions and memory tests determine memory performance in children. And most important, the findings indicated that there were significant differencesfrom grade 2 to grade 8 in free recall and cued recall, but not recognition of all three learning conditions. These findings indicate that action memory develops through school ages. In another word, age has an important role in memory and especially enactment effect; older children had better recall performance in all kind of encoding conditions. These findings can be explained through development of memory strategies, item-specific information processing, and relational information processing.

To explore the joint effect of reading difficulties (RD) and bilingualism on executive functions, 190 children of four groups of 9-12year-olds (41 bilinguals with RD, 45 monolinguals with RD, 45 bilinguals without RD, and 59 monolinguals without RD) were examined on the Concentration game, Tower of Hanoi, and Stroop as measures of executive functioning tapping into inhibitory/attentional control, working memory and planning ability. The most prominent finding was that in terms of RD, the speed of performances decreased dramatically. This general decrease was more pronounced for bilingual children with RD than for their monolingual counterparts. In conclusion, the findings suggest that while bilinguals gain more from executive functions in normal reading, they lose in terms of RD. Such an outcome confirms that executive functions are essential components of both reading and bilingualism, which depending on whether reading conditions are normal or difficult will produce cognitive advantages or disadvantages. Further, it is argued that dissimilarity between the Farsi and Swedish languages may complicate handling of such a situation.

The present study examined the relationships between different types of activities, cognitive and social, and episodic memory and semantic memory. A total of 794 adult men and women from five age cohorts (aged 65-85 at baseline), participating in the longitudinal Betula project on aging, memory, and health, were included in the study. The participants were studied over 10 years (1995-2005) in threes waves. Recognition and recall were used as episodic memory tasks, and knowledge and verbal fluency as semantic memory tasks. The results, after controlling for age, gender, education and some diseases, including heart disease and hypertension, as covariates, showed unidirectional effects of social activity on episodic memory on all test occasions (β = .10). Also, episodic memory predicted change in cognitive activity for all test waves (β = .21-.22). The positive role of social activity on memory function is discussed in terms of cognitive reserve theory, and the reduction of stress. It also seems that episodic memory performance is a predictor of cognitive activity in old people. However, the opposite direction does not hold true.

The purpose of this study was to provide a structure- oriented cross-cultural comparison of the within-group relationships between the negative life events, academic stress and subjective well-being among the Iranian and Swedish undergraduate students. On a sample consisting of 205 students (100 Iranian, 105 Swedish) the negative Event Scale, Academic Stress Questionnaire, Positive and Negative Affect Schedule and Satisfaction with Life Scale were administrated. Hierarchical regression analysis was used to assess the relationships between the multiple factors in both groups. Results of the multiple regression analysis showed that there was no significant difference between the Iranian and Swedish students in terms of the structure –oriented relations of the negative life events, academic stress and subjective wellbeing. However, the results of within-group comparisons showed that among the Iranian students, in comparison to the Swedish students, the negative life events had a high ability in predicting the academic stress and the emotional and cognitive components and that the academic stress had a high ability in predicting the subjective wellbeing. Results of the present study put an emphasis on the similarity of applied features of negative life events and academic stress among the Iranian and Swedish students in predicting the subjective wellbeing.

The roles of positive and negative affect in well-being were studied in two different societies, namely the Iranian and the Swedish. A total of 606 university students (296 Iranian and 310 Swedish) participated in the study. The results showed that, whereas there was no difference between Iranian and Swedish participants in their general level of life satisfaction, differences with regard to positive and negative affect were found. Swedish participants had more positive affect, whereas Iranian participants had more negative affect. In the Swedish sample, the most predictive factor of flourishing was positive affect, while there was a balance affect (between positive and negative affects) in the Iranian sample. The results are discussed from a individualistic-collectivistic perspective.