Abstract
Abstract Cognitive reserve (CR) helps explain the mismatch between expected cognitive decline and observed maintenance of cognitive functioning in older age. Factors such as education, literacy, lifestyle, and social networking are usually considered to be proxies of CR and its variability between individuals. A more direct approach to examine CR is through the assessment of capacity to gain from practice in a standardized challenging cognitive task that demands activation of cognitive resources. In this study, we applied a testing-the-limits paradigm to a group of 136 healthy elderly subjects (60–75 years) and additionally examined the possible contribution of complex mental activities and quality of sleep to cognitive performance gain. We found a significant but variable gain and identified verbal memory, cognitive flexibility, and problem-solving as important factors. This outcome is in line with our earlier study on CR in healthy mental aging. Interestingly and contrary to expectations, our analysis revealed that complex mental activities and sleep quality do not significantly influence CR. Best subset regression showed that better verbal memory and higher cognitive flexibility were related to high CR, which could also be seen when contrasting “high” and “low” cognitive performers; again, complex mental activities and sleep quality did not contribute to this measure of CR. In conclusion, the results of this study support and extend previous findings on CR in older age; further, they underline the need for improvements in existing protocols for assessing CR in a dynamic manner.
Highlights
The concept of cognitive reserve (CR) attempts to explain inter-individual variability in susceptibility to changes in brain function in pathological, and normal aging of the brain [1,2]
Best subset regression showed that better verbal memory and higher cognitive flexibility were related to high Cognitive reserve (CR), which could be seen when contrasting “high” and “low” cognitive performers; again, complex mental activities and sleep quality did not contribute to this measure of CR
We found high intercorrelations between subtests of cognitive architecture, with Digit Symbol Substitution Test (DSST) having a moderate influence on all other measures
Summary
The concept of cognitive reserve (CR) attempts to explain inter-individual variability in susceptibility to changes in brain function in pathological, and normal aging of the brain [1,2] In their model of CR, Satz et al [3] proposed four factors (general intelligence (“g”), complex mental activity, processing resources, and executive function) as “potential reserve proxies” for CR in normal aging. From a conceptual and methodological perspective, it seems desirable to define and assess CR in a more direct fashion, e.g., by “forcing” subjects to activate their individual cognitive resources in a mentally challenging task Such an approach would fit into a model of task-related brain activity depending on the level of task demands, which helps to explain interindividual differences in the context of brain reserve and of the neural basis of CR [13].
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