Department of Psychology, University of Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland.
Department of Humanities, Social and Political Sciences, ETH Zurich, Switzerland.
J Gerontol B Psychol Sci Soc Sci. 2021 Nov 15;76(10):1960-1971. doi: 10.1093/geronb/gbab001.
Individuals' social connections and interpersonal experiences can both shape and be shaped by cognitive functioning. This study examines longitudinal within-person associations between quality of social relations, structure of social relations, and cognitive functioning in older age.
We examined 16-year longitudinal data (3 waves) from 497 older adults (M = 66.07 years, SD = 0.83, range = 64-68 years) from the Interdisciplinary Longitudinal Study of Adult Development and Aging. Quality of social relations was measured by scales on perceived emotional support, instrumental support, and social integration. Structure of social relations was measured by self-reported number of leisure time partner types, indicating social network diversity. Cognitive functioning was assessed as a latent construct consisting of five cognitive tests (i.e., Information, Similarities, Letter Fluency, Picture Completion, Block Design). We used a random intercept cross-lagged panel model in the analysis.
At the within-person level, prior quality of social relations, but not structure of social relations, was positively associated with subsequent cognitive functioning. Moreover, prior cognitive functioning was positively associated with subsequent structure of social relations, but not with quality of social relations.
Quality of social relations is a protective factor of cognitive aging. Additionally, responding to prior lower cognitive functioning, social network diversity reduced, but quality of social relations did not seem to change. Overall, this study suggested that social relations and cognitive functioning mutually influence each other, but different aspects of social relations (i.e., quality, structure) might have different directional associations with cognitive functioning.
个体的社会关系和人际经历既能塑造认知功能，也能被认知功能所塑造。本研究考察了老年人群中社会关系质量、社会关系结构与认知功能之间的纵向个体内关联。
我们分析了来自成人发展与老化跨学科纵向研究的 497 名老年人（M=66.07 岁，SD=0.83，年龄范围为 64-68 岁）的 16 年纵向数据（3 个波次）。社会关系质量通过感知情感支持、工具性支持和社会融合的量表进行测量。社会关系结构通过报告的休闲时间伙伴类型数量来衡量，表明社会网络的多样性。认知功能通过包含五个认知测试（信息、相似性、字母流畅性、图片完成、积木设计）的潜在构念进行评估。我们在分析中使用了随机截距交叉滞后面板模型。
在个体内水平上，先前的社会关系质量，而不是结构，与随后的认知功能呈正相关。此外，先前的认知功能与随后的社会关系结构呈正相关，而与社会关系质量无关。
社会关系质量是认知老化的保护因素。此外，由于先前认知功能较低，社交网络的多样性减少，但社会关系质量似乎没有变化。总的来说，本研究表明社会关系和认知功能相互影响，但社会关系的不同方面（即质量、结构）与认知功能可能具有不同的定向关联。
