Selective review of cognitive aging

Abstract

Research concerned with relations between adult age and cognitive functioning is briefly reviewed. The coverage is necessarily selective, and is organized in terms of five major questions. These are what abilities are related to age, how many distinct influences are contributing to the relations between age and cognitive functioning, do the differences between people increase with advancing age, what is responsible for the discrepancies between cross-sectional and longitudinal age comparisons of cognitive functioning, and what methods can be used to identify causes of age-related influences on cognition. Although definitive answers are not yet possible, quite a bit of information relevant to the questions is now available. Moreover, the existing information has implications for the design, analysis, and interpretation of cognitive and neuropsychological research concerned with aging.

Fig. 1

Means and standard errors for composite scores in five abilities as a function of age based on data from studies by Salthouse and colleagues (e.g., Salthouse, 2009a). Sample sizes ranged from 2369 to 4149.

Fig. 2

Means and standard errors for scores on various neuropsychological tests based on data from studies by Salthouse and colleagues (e.g., Salthouse, Atkinson, & Berish, 2003; Salthouse, Fristoe, & Rhee, 1996; Salthouse & Meinz, 1995; Salthouse, Pink, & Tucker-Drob, 2008). Sample sizes ranged from 269 to 1455.

Fig. 3

Mean T-scores for various cognitive test scores as a function of age (left panel) and standard deviations of the scores as a function of age (right panel). Data from Ronnlund and colleagues (2005, 2006), and from Schaie (2005).

Fig. 4

Means and standard errors for composite memory scores at two test occasions and for a new sample tested at the second occasion, based on data from Ronnlund and colleagues (2005).