Short-term cognitive change in adults from 18 to 80

描述(由申请人提供)：拟议的研究将调查各种认知变量的短期纵向变化，特别强调60岁以下的成年人。尽管之前的研究发现，在涉及年轻人和中年人的纵向比较中，认知变化很少或没有变化，但这项研究将采用两种方法创新，即可变重测间隔和每次测量突发，这将使年龄效应与重测效应区分开来，并通过考虑到正常的短期表现变化来提高检测变化的敏感度。 需要研究的主要问题包括：与年龄相关的认知变化是否在成年早期就开始了；不同认知变量的变化是否彼此独立，在成年的不同时期是否同样如此；以及一个人的认知或身体生活方式等因素在多大程度上缓和了成年后不同认知能力的年龄变化量。在2001年、2002年和2003年完成了相同的13项认知测试的700多名年龄在18岁到之间的成年人将被邀请参加该项目，两个新的样本分别为300名成年人。大多数参与者将在项目的第一年或第二年，在大约两周的时间内接受三次测量突发设计的评估，并在项目的第三、第四或第五年再次进行评估。混合效应模型将被用来获得对每个参与者的年龄和重测变化成分的估计，这些估计将根据它们彼此之间的相关性以及与各种个体差异特征进行检验。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The proposed research will investigate short-term longitudinal change in a broad variety of cognitive variables, with particular emphasis on adults under the age of 60. Although previous studies have found little or no cognitive change in longitudinal comparisons involving young and middle-aged adults, this research will employ two methodological innovations, variable retest intervals and measurement bursts at each occasion, that will allow age effects to be distinguished from retest effects, and will increase sensitivity in the detection of change by taking into account normal short-term variability in performance. Among the primary questions to be investigated are whether age-related cognitive change begins early in adulthood, whether the changes in different cognitive variables are independent of one another and equally so at different periods in adulthood, and the degree to which factors such as one's cognitive or physical lifestyle moderate the amount of age change in different cognitive abilities at various periods in adulthood. Over 700 adults between 18 and 89 years of age who completed the same battery of 13 cognitive tests in 2001, 2002, and 2003 will be invited to participate in the project, as will two new samples of 300 adults each. Most of the participants will be assessed with a measurement burst design of three sessions within a period of about two weeks in either the first or second year of the project, and again in the either the third, fourth, or fifth year of the project. Mixed effects models will be used to obtain estimates of the age and retest components of change for each participant, and these estimates will be examined in terms of their correlations with one another, and with various individual difference characteristics.