Behavioral and Brain Correlates of Emotional Distress in Older Adults During COVID-19 Quarantine

Abstract

COVID-19 led to unprecedented lockdowns and changes in older adults' lives, especially those with type 2 diabetes who have high risk of complications and mortality. We investigated the associations of cognitive and motor function and gray matter volumes (GMVs) with COVID-19 lockdown-related emotional distress of type 2 diabetes older adults, participating in the Israel Diabetes and Cognitive Decline Study. We administered a questionnaire to obtain information about anxiety, depression, general well-being, and optimism during a mandated lockdown. Lower grip strength before lockdown was associated with increased sadness, anxiety, and less optimism. Slower gait speed was associated with greater sadness. Lower GMV was related to greater anxiety during the lockdown when compared with anxiety levels before the COVID-19 outbreak. Yet, global cognition was not associated with any emotional distress measure. These results support the role of good motor function on emotional well-being during acute stress and GMV as a potential underlying mechanism.

FIGURE 1

Heatmap of relationships of self-rated emotional distress with motor function, cognitive function, and gray matter volume, according to Spearman correlations adjusting for age, sex, education, hemoglobin A1C and duration of type 2 diabetes, and for TICV for the gray matter volume analysis. A higher positive correlation value is denoted by red and higher negative correlation is denoted by blue color. TICV indicates total intracranial volume.