Relationships with Adult Children & Cognitive Func - Resubmission - 1

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Relationships with Adult Children and Cognitive Functioning across Social Groups and Nations Project Summary/Abstract Uncovering processes that may slow cognitive decline is a key research goal identified in the National Plan to Address Alzheimer’s Disease. Studies show that social integration and support predict slower cognitive decline. However, few studies have investigated how specific types and characteristics of social relationships are related to cognitive health. Adult children are a highly salient source of social support to aging adults that is growing in importance as life spans lengthen. Older adults with close ties to and frequent contacts with adult children may have better access to the emotional, material, and health-related support that helps stem cognitive decline. Frequent interaction with adult children may also provide stimulation that helps maintain cognitive functioning organically. Yet, the meanings of parent-child relationships vary across race, class, and gender, and aspects of relationships with adult children that support cognition may be especially beneficial to some vulnerable groups. The relationship between ties to adult children and cognition may also depend on national context, and be particularly important in countries that rely on families to provide elder care. This project intends to expand knowledge about how relationships with adult children are related to cognition in hopes of locating aspects of these relationships that may help to slow cognitive decline. Specifically, it will use longitudinal data from the Health and Retirement Study (HRS) and the National Social Life, Health, and Aging Project (NSHAP) to examine how perceptions of support and strain from, the presence of confiding ties to, frequency of contact with, and coresidence with adult children among U.S. adults age 50+ are related to cognitive functioning over the following ten years (Specific Aim 1). These analyses investigate the hypothesis that older persons with close relationships to one or more adult child will have slower rates of cognitive decline than parents who do not and childless peers. The second part of the study will assess race, class and gender differences in these relationships (Specific Aim 2). The findings may contribute to explanations for disparities in cognition among these groups, as well as reveal mechanisms through which they might be addressed. The third and last part of the project will explore whether relationships between the presence of confiding ties to, frequency of contact with, and coresidence with adult children and cognition differ between older adults in the U.S. and Europe using the Survey of Health, Aging and Retirement in Europe (SHARE; Specific Aim 3). Findings of this aim will highlight specific national contexts under which close ties to adult children may benefit cognition most. The analysis of these secondary data sources will be carried out using multilevel growth curve models (for the HRS and SHARE) and cross-lagged panel models (for NSHAP and SHARE). Analyses of NSHAP and SHARE will also use inverse probability weighting to help account for selection processes. Combining the three aims, this project will generate needed insights about whether and under what circumstances parent-child relationships protect cognitive health.