Cognitive-Linguistic Performance and Quality of Life in Healthy Aging

Abstract

Background/Aims: This study investigated quality of life (QoL) in relation to cognitive-linguistic performance and demographic characteristics (age, education and gender) in a large cohort of cognitively healthy older adults. Method: A total of 578 Greek-Cypriots aged 60-91 years were recruited from the Neurocognitive Study on Aging. Of those, 395 healthy participants (171 males and 224 females) who met all study criteria were retained. They completed measures of executive functioning, working memory, receptive vocabulary and confrontational naming in addition to the WHOQOL-BREF (brief version of the WHO QoL questionnaire). Results: There were modest but significant relationships between executive functioning, working memory, vocabulary measures and the WHOQOL-BREF (p < 0.01). MANOVA yielded significant gender and education effects on QoL. Sequential stepwise regression confirmed that gender, depression scores and years of education made significant contributions to predicting the total score on WHOQOL-BREF and accounted for 31% of the variance (R² = 0.310). Conclusion: Self-reports of QoL remain stable in older adulthood. Demographic variables such as gender and years of education affected several domains of QoL, and, along with depression symptomatology, accounted for a significant part of the WHOQOL-BREF variance. Cognitive-linguistic measures correlated on the physical and psychological health domains of the WHOQOL-BREF in healthy older adults.