Hostname: page-component-8448b6f56d-42gr6 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-17T05:37:09.727Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Developing a dimensional model for successful cognitive and emotional aging

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 November 2011

Ipsit V. Vahia ,
Wesley K. Thompson ,
Colin A. Depp ,
Matthew Allison  and
Dilip V. Jeste
Ipsit V. Vahia*
Affiliation:
Department of Psychiatry, University of California, San Diego, CA, USA Sam and Rose Stein Institute for Research on Aging, University of California, San Diego, CA, USA
Wesley K. Thompson
Affiliation:
Department of Psychiatry, University of California, San Diego, CA, USA Sam and Rose Stein Institute for Research on Aging, University of California, San Diego, CA, USA
Colin A. Depp
Affiliation:
Department of Psychiatry, University of California, San Diego, CA, USA Sam and Rose Stein Institute for Research on Aging, University of California, San Diego, CA, USA
Matthew Allison
Affiliation:
Department of Family and Preventative Medicine, University of California, San Diego, CA, USA
Dilip V. Jeste
Affiliation:
Department of Psychiatry, University of California, San Diego, CA, USA Sam and Rose Stein Institute for Research on Aging, University of California, San Diego, CA, USA
*
Correspondence should be addressed to: Ipsit V. Vahia, M.D., Assistant Project Scientist, Sam and Rose Stein Institute for Research on Aging, Department of Psychiatry, University of California, San Diego, 9500 Gilman Drive, #0664, La Jolla, CA 92093, USA. Phone: +1 858-822-3151; Fax: +1 858-543-5475. Email: ivahia@ucsd.edu.
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Background: There is currently a lack of consensus on the definition of successful aging (SA) and existing implementations have omitted constructs associated with SA. We used empirical methods to develop a dimensional model of SA that incorporates a wider range of associated variables, and we examined the relationship among these components using factor analysis and Bayesian Belief Nets.

Methods: We administered a successful aging questionnaire comprising several standardized measures related to SA to a sample of 1948 older women enrolled in the San Diego site of the Women's Health Initiative study. The SA-related variables we included in the model were self-rated successful aging, depression severity, physical and emotional functioning, optimism, resilience, attitude towards own aging, self-efficacy, and cognitive ability. After adjusting for age, education and income, we fitted an exploratory factor analysis model to the SA-related variables and then, in order to address relationships among these factors, we computed a Bayesian Belief Net (BBN) using rotated factor scores.

Results: The SA-related variables loaded onto five factors. Based on the loading, we labeled the factors as follows: self-rated successful aging, cognition, psychosocial protective factors, physical functioning, and emotional functioning. In the BBN, self-rated successful aging emerged as the primary downstream factor and exhibited significant partial correlations with psychosocial protective factors, physical/general status and mental/emotional status but not with cognitive ability.

Conclusions: Our study represents a step forward in developing a dimensional model of SA. Our findings also point to a potential role for psychiatry in improving successful aging by managing depressive symptoms and developing psychosocial interventions to improve self-efficacy, resilience, and optimism.

Keywords

cognitionresiliencephysical functionemotional functionpsychological protective factors
Type
2011 IPA JUNIOR RESEARCH AWARDS – FIRST-PRIZE WINNER
Information
International Psychogeriatrics , Volume 24 , Issue 4 , April 2012 , pp. 515 - 523
Copyright
Copyright © International Psychogeriatric Association 2011

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Blazer, D. G. (2006). Successful aging. American Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry, 14, 2–5.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Bowling, A. and Iliffe, S. (2006). Which model of successful ageing should be used? Baseline findings from a British longitudinal survey of ageing. Age and Ageing, 35, 607–614.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Bowling, A. and Iliffe, S. (2011). Psychological approach to successful ageing predicts future quality of life in older adults. Health and Quality of Life Outcomes, 9, 13.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Connor, K. M. and Davidson, J. R. (2003). Development of a new resilience scale: the Connor-Davidson Resilience Scale (CD-RISC). Depression and Anxiety, 18, 76–82.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Crowther, M., Parker, M., Achnebaum, W., Larimore, W. L. and Koenig, H. G. (2002). Rowe and Kahn's model of successful aging revisited: positive spirituality – the forgotten factor. The Gerontologist, 42, 613–620.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Dawes, S. E., Palmer, B. W., Allison, M. A., Ganiats, T. G. and Jeste, D. V. (2011). Social desirability does not confound reports of wellbeing or of socio-demographic attributes by older women. Ageing and Society, 31, 438–454.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Depp, C. A. and Jeste, D. V. (2006). Definitions and predictors of successful aging: a comprehensive review of larger quantitative studies. American Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry, 14, 6–20.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Drachman, D. A. and Swearer, J. M. (1996). Screening for dementia: Cognitive Assessment Screening Test (CAST). American Family Physician, 54, 1957–1962.Google ScholarPubMed
Hasanat, M. H. A., Ramachandram, D. and Mandava, R. (2010). Bayesian belief network learning algorithms for modeling contextual relationships in natural imagery: A comparative study. Artificial Intelligence Review, 34, 291–308.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jeste, D. V. et al. (2010a). Expert consensus on the characteristics of wisdom: A Delphi Method study. Gerontologist, 50, 668–680.Google Scholar
Jeste, D. V., Depp, C. A. and Vahia, I. V. (2010b). Successful cognitive and emotional aging. World Psychiatry, 9, 78–84.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Jeste, D. V., Wolkowitz, O. M. and Palmer, B. W. (2011). Divergent trajectories of physical, cognitive and psychosocial aging in schizophrenia. Schizophrenia Bulletin, 37, 451–455.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Kavirajan, H. et al. (in press). Attitude toward own aging and mental health in post-menopausal women. Asian Journal of Psychiatry.Google Scholar
Lamond, A. J. et al. (2008). Measurement and predictors of resilience among community-dwelling older women. Journal of Psychiatric Research, 43, 148–154.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Lawton, M. P. (1975). The Philadelphia Geriatric Center Morale Scale: a revision. Journal of Gerontology, 30, 85–89.Google Scholar
Lewis, J. P. (2011). Successful aging through the eyes of Alaska native elders: hat it means to be an elder in Bristol Bay, AK. Gerontologist, 51, 540–549.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lyness, J. M., Chapman, B. P., McGriff, J., Drayer, R. and Duberstein, P. R. (2009). One-year outcomes of minor and subsyndromal depression in older primary care patients. International Psychogeriatriatrics, 21, 60–68.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
McCall-Hosenfeld, J. S. et al. (2008). Correlates of sexual satisfaction among sexually active postmenopausal women in the Women's Health Initiative-Observational Study. Journal of General Internal Medicine, 23, 2000–2009.Google Scholar
Meeks, T. W., Vahia, I. V., Lavretsky, H., Kulkarni, G. and Jeste, D. V. (2011). A tune in “a minor” can “b major”: a review of epidemiology, illness course, and public health implications of subthreshold depression in older adults. Journal of Affective Disorders, 129, 126–142.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Meisner, B. A., Dogra, S., Logan, A. J., Baker, J. and Weir, P. L. (2010). Do or decline?: Comparing the effects of physical inactivity on biopsychosocial components of successful aging. Journal of Health Psychology, 15, 688–696.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Montross, L. P. et al. (2006). Correlates of self-rated successful aging among community-dwelling older adults. American Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry, 14, 43–51.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Pruchno, R. A., Wilson-Genderson, M. and Cartwright, F. (2010). A two-factor model of successful aging. Journals of Gerontology: Psychological Sciences and Social Sciences, 65, 671–679.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Radloff, L. S. (1977). The CES-D Scale: a self-report depression scale for research in the general population. Applied Psychological Measurement, 3, 385–401.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rowe, J. W. and Kahn, R. L. (1987). Human aging: usual and successful. Science, 237, 143–149.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Scheier, M. F., Carver, C. S. and Bridges, M. W. (1994). Distinguishing optimism from neuroticism (and trait anxiety, self-mastery, and self-esteem): a re-evaluation of the Life Orientation Test. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 67, 1063–1078.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sherer, M. et al. (1982). The self-efficacy scale: construction and validation. Psychological Reports, 51, 663–671.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Strawbridge, W. J., Wallhagen, M. I. and Cohen, R. D. (2002). Successful aging and well-being: self-rated compared with Rowe and Kahn. Gerontologist, 42, 727–733.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Tsamardinos, I., Aliferis, C. F. and Statnikov, A. (2003). Algorithms for Large Scale Markov Blanket Discovery. Proceedings of the Sixteenth International Florida Artificial Intelligence Research Society Conference (pp. 376–381). Menlo Park, CA: AAAI Press.Google Scholar
Vahia, I. V. et al. (2010). Subthreshold depression and successful aging in older women. American Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry, 18, 212–220.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Vahia, I. V., Chattillion, E., Kavirajan, H. and Depp, C. A. (2011a). Psychological protective factors across the lifespan: Implications for psychiatry. Psychiatric Clinics of North America, 34, 231–248.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Vahia, I. V. et al. (2011b). Correlates of spirituality in older women. Aging and Mental Health, 15, 97–102.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
van Buuren, S. (2007). Multiple imputation of discrete and continuous data by fully conditional specification. Statistical Methods in Medical Research, 16, 219–242.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
van Ness, P. H. and Kasl, S. V. (2003). Religion and cognitive dysfunction in an elderly cohort. Journals of Gerontology: Psychological Sciences and Social Sciences, 58, S21–S29.Google Scholar
Ware, J. E. and Sherbourne, C. D. (1992). The MOS 36-item short-form health survey (SF-36). I. Conceptual framework and item selection. Medical Care, 30, 473–483.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Weir, P. L., Meisner, B. A. and Baker, J. (2010). Successful aging across the years: does one model fit everyone? Journal of Health Psychology, 15, 680–687.Google Scholar
Women's Health Initiative (1998). Design of the Women's Health Initiative Clinical Trial and Observational Study. Controlled Clinical Trials, 19, 61–109.CrossRefGoogle Scholar