Cognition and Diabetes: Examining Sex Differences Using a Longitudinal Sample of Older Adults

Abstract

Objectives: This study aims to investigate sex-based differences in the diabetes status and cognition relationship using a representative sample of older Americans. Methods: Using a sample of 19,190 females and 15,580 males from the Health and Retirement Study, we conduct mixed-effects linear regression analyses to examine sex differences in the association between diabetes and cognition over a 20-year follow-up period among older adults in the United States. Main Findings: Females experience slightly steeper declines in cognition that are further exacerbated by diabetes. At age 65, females without diabetes have significantly higher cognition than males; this gap is eliminated by age 85. Among diabetics, there is no initial sex disparity, but females' cognition becomes significantly lower than males' over the following 20 years. Principal Conclusions: Relative to males, females are particularly susceptible to diabetes-related declines in cognition with increasing age.

Keywords: Health and Retirement Study; United States; aging; cognitive decline; diabetes; population health.