CHANGES IN PERSPECTIVE TAKING ABILITY IN AGING PROCESS ARE DEPENDENT ON GENDER AND ALZHEIMER-RELATED COGNITIVE DECLINE

Abstract

In recent years, there has been growing interest in age-related differences in emotional functions across life span, in part due to systematic move toward early detection of unhealthy aging such as Alzheimer's disease (AD). Accordingly, subtle changes in emotional functions that manifest in social relationships are gaining more attention. Perspective taking (PT), as defined as the tendency or ability to spontaneously adopt the psychological point of view of others, is an aspect of empathy and is a fundamental prerequisite to interact in complex social environments and relationships. As cognitive functions generally decline with age, whether it be healthy or unhealthy aging, it has been speculated that PT ability would also decline with age—though not systematically investigated. The aim of the current study is two-fold: (1) Examine if PT declines with age in healthy adults; and, (2) examine if the PT ability in older adults changes with AD. Total of 455 subjects (age range: 21 ∼ 87) from the Korean Brain Aging Study for Early Diagnosis & Prediction of Alzheimer's Disease (KBASE), an ongoing prospective cohort study, were included for this analysis. All participants underwent comprehensive clinical and neuropsychological assessment, and were identified as either cognitively normal (CN), mild cognitive impairment, or AD dementia. The Interpersonal Reactivity Index (IRI), a 28-item brief, multidimensional, self-report survey assessing aspects of empathy, was administered to all participants. The perspective taking subscale was used in the analysis. In overall CN adults, PT ability does not appear to change with age. However, an interaction between age and gender was found on PT ability where a linear pattern of decline in PT associated with age was seen only in male participants (F(1,155)=9.41, p = .003, R2=.057). In older adults, significant effects of diagnosis on PT ability was found after controlling for the effects age and gender (F(2,383)=8.62, p < .001, ηp2 = .043). The current findings indicate that PT changes differently between gender with aging while in cognitively healthy stage and that AD process negatively affects PT ability regardless of gender or age.