The Mediating Effects of Education and Occupational Complexity Between Race and Longitudinal Change in Late Life Cognition in ACTIVE
Year: 2024
Type: article
Abstract: This study examined educational and occupational inequality as two aspects of social determinants of health that might mediate the longitudinal relationship between racialization and late life cognitive level and change. Participants were 2371 individuals racialized as Black and White from the ACTIVE study who provided occupational data. Data were analyzed from baseline and five assessments over 10-years using structural equation modeling. Black/White race served as the predictor, occupational complexity (OC) and years of education as mediators, and cognitive (memory, reasoning, and speed of processing) intercept, linear slope, and quadratic slope as the dependent variables. Black/White race showed significant indirect associations through education and OC on level of performance in cognition, linear change in reasoning and memory, and quadratic change in reasoning. Education and OC accounted for 11-16% of the association between race and cognitive level and represent modifiable social determinants of health that are associated with disparities in cognitive aging.
Source: Research on Aging
Language: English
Subfield: Health
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: bronze
Funders: Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, McKnight Foundation, University of Florida, Johns Hopkins University, Pennsylvania State University, University of Alabama at Birmingham, New England Research Institutes, National Institutes of Health, School of Medicine, Indiana University, National Institute on Aging, National Institute of Nursing Research
Awards: G1247343150, G15558500, G1594817550, G2059235590, ACTIVE Phase III: HRC Field Site, G2396893096, ACTIVE Phase III: JHU Field Site, G2978231805, 1Florida Alzheimer's Disease Research Center, ACTIVE Phase III: IU Field Site, G4373630487, G4438921143, G4601050373, G5176264939, G5337856074, G5463399080, ACTIVE Cognitive Training Trial: 20-Yr Follow-up of Functioning, Health, & Dementia, G5741906230, G5853069924, ACTIVE Phase III: UAB Field Site, ACTIVE Phase III: PSU Field Site, G625660684, G6296336846, ACTIVE Phase III: UF/WSU Field Site, G6581352804, G6709451946, G6711873528, G7326979531, G7871987278, Research Training in Non-Pharmacological Interventions for Cognition in Aging, MCI, and Alzheimer's Disease, G8757048112, ACTIVE Coordinating Center, G8880810126, G8897098091, G9000165111
OpenAlex ID: W4394996284