Early-life Education Research Articles

Self-reported socio-economic status, social, physical and leisure activities and risk for malnutrition in late life: a cross-sectional population-based study.

Our goal was to evaluate the proportion of community-dwelling elderly people at risk for malnutrition and the effect of different socioeconomic status (SES) indicators as well as social, physical and leisure activities in late life on the risk for malnutrition. A cross-sectional population-based study. A sub-urban area in Northern Italy. 698 community-dwelling older persons. The nutritional status of participants was assessed through the Mini Nutritional Assessment-Short Form (MNA-SF). SES was defined by means of early-life education, longest occupation, and late-life financial conditions. The following indicators were also evaluated: social contacts, and performing mental, physical and leisure activities during late-life. Chronic diseases, functional, cognitive and affective status were considered as potential confounders when examining the risk for malnutrition by logistic regression models. 8% of the participants (average age 75.6 years, 408 women) were at risk for malnutrition (MNA-SF ≤ 11). Low education, poor financial condition, and lack of physical and leisure activities showed a crude association with risk for malnutrition. Multi-adjusted logistic regression models showed that only low education (OR=2.9; 95% CI=1.2-6.8) and lack of physical activity (OR=4.4;95%CI=2.0-9.7) were independently associated with the risk for malnutrition. Low education and lack of physical activity in late-life may affect the risk for malnutrition in the elderly. Further studies are needed to clarify the cause-effect relationship between lack of physical activity and malnutrition.

Effects of music and art education in early life and oral functions on the QOL of the Takarazuka Revue Company OG compared with general elderly females

Today, Japan is becoming a super-aged society, with senior citizens already constituting over 21% of the population. In this situation, the question of how elderly people can extend their lives and enjoy independent lifestyles is becoming more important. The present study aims to clarify the relationship between the Quality of Life (QOL) of elderly females and their current oral functions and experiences of music and art education in early life. We carried out a survey study focusing on elderly females (Takarazuka Revue Company OG group and general female group) by carrying out a questionnaire survey and comparing cognitive function, oral examinations, cerebral atrophy in magnetic resonance imaging, and other characteristics. It was shown that the Takarazuka Revue Company OG group had greater hippocampal volumes and significantly higher cognitive functions than the general female group. In addition, in the general female group, there was a significant correlation between a decrease in the number of remaining teeth and a decrease in activities in daily living, but in the Takarazuka Revue Company OG group, no such correlation was observed. The results showed that those who have received art education as part of their careers over an extensive period since early life have higher levels of cognitive function, QOL, physical activity, social activity and life satisfaction compared with the general female group; showing that they sense a purpose in life and live with a positive attitude. In contrast, in the general female group, those who have continued to enjoy hobbies have higher levels of cognitive function, QOL, physical activity, social activity and life satisfaction than those who have not, thus showing that they live with a positive attitude.

Sustainable poverty amelioration through early life education in a peri-urban community of Lagos, Nigeria

ABSTRACTBackgroundDaycare centres/nurseries have become popular because of the need for working mothers to leave young children with caregivers. However, the high poverty level (54% relative and 35% extreme poverty) makes it difficult for disadvantaged parents to pay the high fees charged by the centres. This study describes an attempt to economically empower mothers through the organisation of free early life education in a peri-urban community in Lagos.ObjectivesThe aim of the study was to examine early life education for under-fives as a means of economic empowerment of mothers and sustainable poverty amelioration.MethodThe methodology included a non-randomised selection of 34 disadvantaged mothers by criteria, a prospective intervention utilising community resources to organise early childhood education, an in-depth interview of mothers, and observation of the outcomes over a 5-year period.ResultsThe result of the study showed that no mother preferred keeping a child older than three years at home. Access to early childhood education gave mothers opportunity to undergo vocational training (1, 2.8%) and take up new/additional jobs (12, 35.3%). All mothers and 32 (80%) of the participating families more than doubled their income, earning up to twenty thousand Naira (approximately $182) per month from the first year of participation. Finally, selection criteria and periodic assessment of immunisation/growth monitoring records of participants’ children improved compliance with primary health care service utilisation.ConclusionOrganisation of early childhood education had the potential for sustainable poverty amelioration through economic empowerment of mothers.

Education, occupation and retirement age effects on the age of onset of Alzheimer's disease

To determine the effects of early life education, mid life employment and later life retirement age on the age of onset (AOO) of Alzheimer's disease (AD). Multiple regression analyses were carried out using data for 1320 probable AD cases, of which 382 were males with employment and retirement age data, using informant based information on education and employment. No relation was found between years of education, best qualification obtained, or employment variables in males and the AOO of AD. A significant effect of later retirement age in delaying the AOO of AD was seen in males. In this study no effect of education or employment was seen, although this may be due to limited variance in the study population. The significant effect of retirement age may have several explanations, the most interesting of which would be the suggestion that active employment later in life allows an individual to prolong their cognitive assets above the threshold for dementia.

“Below average” self-assessed school performance and Alzheimer's disease in the Aging, Demographics, and Memory Study

Background A low level of formal education is becoming accepted as a risk factor for Alzheimer's disease (AD). Although increasing attention has been paid to differences in educational quality, no previous studies addressed participants' own characterizations of their overall performance in school. We examined whether self-assessed school performance is associated with AD beyond the effects of educational level alone. Methods Participants were drawn from the population-representative Aging, Demographics, and Memory Study (ADAMS, 2000-2002). The ADAMS participants were asked about their performance in school. Possible response options included “above average,” “average,” or “below average.” The ADAMS participants also underwent a full neuropsychological battery, and received a research diagnosis of possible or probable AD. Results The 725 participants (mean age, 81.8 years; 59% female; 16% African-American) varied in self-assessed educational performance: 29% reported “above average,” 64% reported “average,” and 7% reported “below average” school performance. Participants with a lower self-assessed school performance had higher proportions of AD: 11% of participants with “above average” self-assessed performance had AD, as opposed to 12% of participants with “average” performance and 26% of participants with “below average” performance ( P < 0.001). After controlling for subjects' years in school, a literacy test score (Wide-Range Achievement Test), age, sex, race/ethnicity, apolipoprotein E-ɛ4 status, socioeconomic status, and self-reported comorbidities, respondents with “below average” self-assessed school performance were four times more likely to have AD compared with those of “average” performance (odds ratio, 4.0; 95% confidence interval, 1.2–14). “Above average” and “average” self-assessed school performance did not increase or decrease the odds of having AD (odds ratio, 0.9; 95% confidence interval, 0.5–1.7). Conclusions We suggest an association between “below average” self-assessed school performance and AD beyond the known association with formal education. Efforts to increase cognitive reserve through better school performance, in addition to increasing the number of years of formal education in early life, may be important in reducing vulnerability throughout the life course.

Cognitive activities delay onset of memory decline in persons who develop dementia

Persons destined to develop dementia experience an accelerated rate of decline in cognitive ability, particularly in memory. Early life education and participation in cognitively stimulating leisure activities later in life are 2 factors thought to reflect cognitive reserve, which may delay the onset of the memory decline in the preclinical stages of dementia. We followed 488 initially cognitively intact community residing individuals with epidemiologic, clinical, and cognitive assessments every 12 to 18 months in the Bronx Aging Study. We assessed the influence of self-reported participation in cognitively stimulating leisure activities on the onset of accelerated memory decline as measured by the Buschke Selective Reminding Test in 101 individuals who developed incident dementia using a change point model. Each additional self-reported day of cognitive activity at baseline delayed the onset of accelerated memory decline by 0.18 years. Higher baseline levels of cognitive activity were associated with more rapid memory decline after that onset. Inclusion of education did not significantly add to the fit of the model beyond the effect of cognitive activities. Our findings show that late life cognitive activities influence cognitive reserve independently of education. The effect of early life education on cognitive reserve may be mediated by cognitive activity later in life. Alternatively, early life education may be a determinant of cognitive reserve, and individuals with more education may choose to participate in cognitive activities without influencing reserve. Future studies should examine the efficacy of increasing participation in cognitive activities to prevent or delay dementia.

What You Don’t Know CAN Hurt You—Or at Least Mislead You: Family Behaviors, Unobserved Heterogeneities, and the Determinants and Impacts of Human Resources over the Life Cycle

What You Don’t Know CAN Hurt You—Or at Least Mislead You: Family Behaviors, Unobserved Heterogeneities, and the Determinants and Impacts of Human Resources over the Life Cycle Jere R. Behrman (bio) “What you don’t know can’t hurt you” is a common saying, variants of which date back at least to the sixteenth century.1 However, a common theme in my research on Latin America and the Caribbean, for which I am honored to receive the Latin American and Caribbean Economic Association’s (LACEA) 2008 Carlos Díaz-Alejandro Prize, is that what you don’t know can, indeed, hurt you—or at least mislead you in interpreting empirical research. In this Carlos Díaz-Alejandro Prize Lecture, I first briefly recap a number of milestones in my journey as an empirical microeconomist involved in Latin America and the Caribbean, then I present a simple framework for analyzing household investments in human resources to illustrate why what you don’t know can mislead you in the presence of unobserved heterogeneities, and finally I give an number of related empirical illustrations based on my research in Latin America and the Caribbean as well as elsewhere. My involvement in analyzing Latin American and Caribbean economic issues has been a long journey, and it is still under way. Along the way, I have worked with many fellow travelers in many countries, institutions, and projects. Here I highlight a few of the larger projects before returning to the main theme of the paper. From 1968 to 1970, with research continuing until 1976, I participated in a project coordinated and funded by the Chilean National Planning Office (ODEPLAN), Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and the Ford [End Page 1] Foundation, in which I was involved in empirical macroeconomic modeling with a focus on adjustments within a macroeconomic context.2 Near the end of this period, I also undertook the Chilean country study in the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) multi-country comparative project on “Foreign Trade Regimes and Economic Development,” headed by Jagdish Bhagwati and Anne O. Krueger.3 My colleagues in the ODEPLAN project, whom I first met over forty years ago in Chile, included Carlos Díaz-Alejandro, in whose honor the LACEA prize was established, and Edmar Bacha, the first recipient of this prize in 1998. From 1975 to 1987, I spearheaded the Nicaragua Socioeconomic Survey of Women, an interdisciplinary survey including data on a subsample of adult sisters. The data support analyses that control for unobserved components of common childhood family background in estimating the impacts of human resources.4 From 1980 to the present, I have participated in World Bank projects on a range of topics on the microeconomics of human resources in Latin America, some of which are reviewed below. Research topics included Brazilian school quality, the Brazilian governmental social welfare function underlying the distribution of public resources for schooling, Brazilian cohort effects and geographical effects, the impact of a Bolivian early childhood development program, attrition in longitudinal surveys in developing countries including Bolivia, the impact of human capital investments in Latin America and elsewhere, and the impact of birth weight over the life cycle in developing countries including Latin America.5 From 1982 to the present, I have been involved in a series of Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) and IDB Research Networks projects on macroeconomic modeling, human resource investments, early life nutrition, pre-school child development, quality of life, intergenerational mobility, social protection, and distribution.6 [End Page 2] From 1996 to the present, I have worked with a team evaluating Mexico’s PROGRESA (now called Oportunidades), a program of human resource investment and anti-poverty conditional cash transfers. The evaluation was initially coordinated by the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) and subsequently continued by the Instituto Nacional de Salud Pública (INSP). Our research emphasized schooling and early life nutrition.7 From 2000 to the present, I have been involved with the Universidad de Chile and the government of Chile in implementing the Social Protection Survey. This collaborative data collection served as the basis for studies on pension systems, schooling, early life education, and evaluation.8 From 2000 to the present...

Oral Health and Cognitive Function in the Third National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES III)

To investigate the association between oral health and cognitive function in early-, mid-, and late-adult life. A secondary analysis was carried out of a large, well-characterized community sample (NHANES III). Analyzed variables included three measures of oral health (gingival bleeding, loss of periodontal attachment, loss of teeth) and three measures of cognitive function: the Symbol Digit Substitution Test (SDST), the Serial Digit Learning Test (SDLT) (both in 5138 participants aged 20-59 years), and a Story Recall test (in 1555 participants aged >or=70 years). Other covariates in linear regression models included age, gender, ethnicity, education and poverty, and cardiovascular risk factors. Worse scores on all three measures of oral health status were significantly associated with poorer performance on all three measures of cognitive function after adjustment for age. Education was an important confounding factor. However, after full adjustment for all other covariates, gingival bleeding (%) and loss of periodontal attachment (%) remained associated with relative impairment on SDST score (B coefficients both = 0.003), and gingival bleeding was associated with relative impairment on SDLT (B = 0.017). No effect modification by age was observed. Poor oral health is associated with worse cognitive function throughout adult life. This may, in part, be accounted for by early life education and social status. However, the possibility of direct causal pathways requires further investigation.

Risk of Late-Life Depression Across 10 European Union Countries: Deconstructing the Education Effect

Assess influence of education and noneducation-based measures of socioeconomic status on depression, illuminating the cumulative and income-adjusted effects cross-nationally. Cross-sectional study of 22,777 men and women (50 to 104 years) from 10 European countries. Individual-level data were collected from the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE). Educational attainment was a strong predictor of late-life depression across all countries. Depression rates ranged from 18.10% in Denmark to 36.84% in Spain, reflecting a North- South gradient. Odds of depression were approximately twice as high among adults with less than a high school education compared with those of greater educational background (p < .001). Inverse association between educational attainment and depression remained significant independent of all other sociodemographic variables. Socioeconomic disparities in depression persist throughout later life. Variation in impact of education on depression cross-nationally illuminates need for future research into the protective effects of early-life education.

Childlessness, Psychological Well-being, and Life Satisfaction Among the Elderly in China

This paper examines the effects of childlessness on the well-being of persons aged 65 and above in China. It is based on an application of ordered-logit regression in the analysis of the data from the 2002 wave of the Chinese Longitudinal Healthy Longevity Survey (CLHLS) conducted in 22 provinces of China (N = 13,447). It compares parents with the childless elderly, focusing on three dimensions of psychological well-being, namely feelings of anxiety, loneliness, and uselessness, and on life satisfaction. The findings include the following. First, with control of social demographic variables of age, gender and education, childlessness is significantly associated with life satisfaction, feeling of anxiety and loneliness, but not feeling of uselessness. The childless elderly are less satisfied with their lives and feel more anxious and lonely than do parents, but they do not necessarily feel significantly more useless. Second, when controlled with social-demographic variables and additional socioeconomic variables of residence, living arrangement, availability of pension and medical services, childlessness is no longer significantly related to anxiety and loneliness, and it is related at only a marginally-significant level to life satisfaction. Third, individual education, place of residence, living arrangements, economic security and access to medical services are consistently related to life satisfaction and psychological well-being among the elderly. We conclude that providing social investments in education in early life and economic security and medical insurance in later life for both the childless and parents are crucial for improving individual psychological well-being and life satisfaction for the elderly.

Regulation of hippocampal cholesterol metabolism by apoE and environmental stimulation

Alzheimer's disease is associated with genetic risk factors, of which the allele E4 of apolipoprotein E (apoE4) is the most prevalent, and it is also affected by environmental factors such as early life education. We have recently shown, utilizing apoE-deficient and apoE transgenic mice, that synaptogenesis in the hippocampus following environmental stimulation is affected by apoE. In view of the pivotal role of cholesterol in synaptic plasticity, and of its suggested role in synaptogenesis, we presently examined the effects of apoE and environmental stimulation on brain cholesterol homeostasis. The hippocampal levels of cholesterol and its precursors and metabolites in control mice were not affected by exposure to environmental stimulation. In contrast, the hippocampal levels of cholesterol and its precursors lathosterol and desmosterol and metabolite 24S-hydroxycholesterol were lower in apoE-deficient mice that were maintained in a regular environmental than those of corresponding control mice, whereas they were markedly elevated following environmental stimulation. Histological and immunohistochemical experiments revealed that the combined stimulatory effects of apoE deficiency and environmental stimulation on cholesterol metabolism were associated with marked activation of hippocampal astrocytes and with the abnormal accumulation of cholesterol in neurons and astrocytes. These effects were rescued similarly in apoE3 and apoE4 transgenic mice. These findings suggest that apoE plays an important role in the translocation of cholesterol from astrocytes to neurons in vivo and in the regulation and homeostasis of this process.

Women in science: career processes and outcomes

Why do so few women choose a career in science - even as they move into medicine and law in ever-greater numbers? This comprehensive study of gender differences in science careers provides a systematic account of how US youths are selected into and out of science education in early life and how social forces affect career outcomes later in the science labour market. The authors explore the extent and causes of gender differences in undergraduate and graduate science education, in scientists' geographic mobility, in research productivity, in promotion rates and earnings, and in the experience of immigrant scientists. They conclude that the gender gap in parenting responsibilities is a critical barrier to the further advancement of women in science.

Brain aging in a sample of normal Egyptians cognition, education, addiction and smoking

The impact of duration of education, cannabis addiction and smoking on cognition and brain aging is studied in 211 normal Egyptian volunteers with mean age 46.4±3.6 years (range: 20–76 years). Subjects were classified into two groups: Gr I (non-addicts) with 174 subjects, mean age 49.9±3.8 years (range 20–76 years), smokers and non-smokers, educated and non-educated and Gr II (cannabis addicts) with 37 subjects, mean age 43.6±2.6 years (range 20–72 years) all smokers, educated and non-educated. Outcome measures included the Paced Auditory Serial Addition test (PASAT) for testing attention and the Trailmaking test A, and B (TMa and TMb) for testing psychomotor performance. Age correlated positively with score of Trailmaking test (TMb) in the non-addict group and in the addict group (TMa and TMb). Years of education correlated negatively with scores of Trialmaking test (TMb) in the non-addict group (Gr I) but not the addict group (Gr II). However, in both groups mean scores of the Trailmaking test (TMa) were significantly lower in subjects with a primary level of education than those with higher levels of education. No significant difference was detected between male smokers and nonsmokers of Gr I (non-addicts) regarding any of the neuropsychological tests. Yet, smokers and the non-educated group had poorer attention compared to non-smokers of the same group. Cannabis addicts (Gr II) had significantly poorer attention than non-addict normal volunteers (Gr I). It is concluded that impairment of psychomotor performance is age related whether in normal non-addicts or in cannabis addicts. A decline in attention was detected in cannabis addicts and has been considered a feature of pathological aging. Education in early life as well as the duration of education are neuroprotectors for brain aging more so in the non-addict than addict group. Though cigarette smoking per se has no effect on cognitive abilities in normal aging, it becomes evident that its association with lack of education impairs attention.

Lifestyles, Blood Pressure and Serum Lipid Profile among Medical Students in Japan

Lifestyles, blood pressure and serum concentrations of total cholesterol (TC) and HDL-cholesterol (HDL-C) were surveyed on medical students aged 21-25 years (217 males and 72 females) of Fukuoka University between 1987 and 1989. Smoking and alcohol drinking were as prevalent among male students as among adult men in general population while smoking rate of female students was much lower than that of women in general population. In the analysis of 217 male students, obesity was most strongly related to raised blood pressure and atherogenic lipid profile. Sport activity was moderately associated with favorable cardiovascular risk profiles. There was a positive relation between smoking and TC/HDL ratio, but alcohol intake was not materially associated with this index of atherogenicity although it was significantly associated with elevated levels of HDL-C. Men reporting parental hypertension not only had higher systolic blood pressure but also showed lower levels of HDL-C. The present study indicates that lifestyles of young adults substantially influence blood pressure and serum lipids, and emphasizes the importance of health education in early life for the prevention of cardiovas-cular diseases.

Dr. George Birkbeck and Technical Education

ON December 1, a century ago, Dr. George Birkbeck died in London and was buried in Kensal Green Cemetery. His name to–day is recalled by Birkbeck College, London, which began its career as the London Mechanics' Institution with Birkbeck as its president. There were at one time hundreds of such institutions, and no doubt many of them exist to–day, but they may all be said to have sprung from the classes for mechanics started by Birkbeck in 1800 at the Anderson College of Glasgow, in which as a young man of twenty–four he held the chair of natural philosophy. Born in Settle, Yorkshire, on January 10, 1776, Birkbeck studied medicine at Leeds, London and Edinburgh, but he began his active career as a lecturer. In 1804 he set up in practice in the City of London and there became known to Hume, Grote, Brougham, and many other men of liberal ideas. In 1809 he assisted in founding the London Institution, in 1824 became president of the Mechanics' Institution, and was a projector of University College, *nd a supporter of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge. He was, as his biographer J. G. Godard says, a “National Reformer”. In the prospectus of his class of 1800, he stated that it was “for persons engaged in the exercise of the mechanical arts, whose education in early life has precluded even the possibility of acquiring the smallest portion of scientific knowledge”. He lived to see knowledge brought within the reach of all.