Center for Social Epidemiology and Population Health, Department of Epidemiology, University of Michigan School of Public Health.
Harvard Center for Population and Development Studies, Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health.
Psychol Aging. 2020 Sep;35(6):818-830. doi: 10.1037/pag0000552. Epub 2020 Jul 23.
Research on early life adversity and later-life cognitive function is conflicting, with little evidence from low-income settings. We investigated associations between adverse childhood experiences and cognitive function in an older population who grew up under racial segregation during South African apartheid. Data were from 1,871 adults aged 40-79 in the population-representative "Health and Ageing in Africa: A Longitudinal Study of an INDEPTH Community in South Africa" in 2015. The adverse childhood experiences were having a parent unemployed for > 6 months; having parents who argued or fought often; having a parent who drank excessively, used drugs, or had mental health problems; and physical abuse from parents. Executive function, language, visuospatial ability, and memory were assessed with the Oxford Cognitive Screen-Plus, a validated cognitive assessment designed for low-income, low-literacy settings. We estimated associations between adverse childhood experiences and latent cognitive domain z-scores using multiple-indicator, multiple-cause structural equation models. Childhood adversities were reported by 15% (parental unemployment for > 6 months), 25% (parents argued or fought often), 25% (a parent drank excessively, used drugs, or had mental health problems), and 35% (physical abuse from parent) of respondents. They were not associated with cognition, except that having a parent who drank excessively, used drugs, or had mental health problems was associated with lower memory z-scores (-0.07; 95% CI [-0.13, -0.01]). This is one of the first investigations into later-life cognitive outcomes associated with early adversity in a population with a historical context of pervasive trauma, and suggests that later-life memory may be vulnerable to early adversity. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved).
研究表明，童年逆境与晚年认知功能之间的关系存在争议，而来自低收入环境的证据则很少。我们调查了在南非种族隔离时期长大的老年人群中，不良的童年经历与认知功能之间的关系。数据来自于 2015 年在具有代表性的“非洲健康与老龄化：南非一个深入社区的纵向研究”中，年龄在 40-79 岁的 1871 名成年人。童年逆境包括父母失业超过 6 个月；父母经常争吵或打架；父母酗酒、吸毒或有精神健康问题；以及父母的身体虐待。执行功能、语言、视空间能力和记忆是通过牛津认知筛查加（Oxford Cognitive Screen-Plus）来评估的，这是一种为低收入、低识字率环境设计的经过验证的认知评估工具。我们使用多指标、多原因结构方程模型来估计童年逆境与潜在认知领域 z 分数之间的关联。15%（父母失业超过 6 个月）、25%（父母经常争吵或打架）、25%（父母酗酒、吸毒或有精神健康问题）和 35%（父母的身体虐待）的受访者报告了童年逆境。除了父母酗酒、吸毒或有精神健康问题与记忆 z 分数较低（-0.07；95%CI[-0.13，-0.01]）有关外，它们与认知没有关联。这是首次在具有普遍创伤历史背景的人群中调查与早期逆境相关的晚年认知结果的研究之一，表明晚年记忆可能容易受到早期逆境的影响。（PsycInfo 数据库记录（c）2020 APA，保留所有权利）。
