Park Hannah, Aul Courtney, DeGutis Joseph, Lo On-Yee, Poole Victoria N, McGlinchey Regina, Bean Jonathan F, Leritz Elizabeth, Esterman Michael
Boston Attention and Learning Laboratory (BALLAB), VA Boston Healthcare System, Boston, MA, United States.
Department of Psychology, Brandeis University, Waltham, MA, United States.
Front Aging Neurosci. 2021 Jul 5;13:703434. doi: 10.3389/fnagi.2021.703434. eCollection 2021.
Although cognitive decline has previously been associated with mobility limitations and frailty, the relationship between sustained attention and gait speed is incompletely characterized. To better quantify the specificity of the sustained attention and gait speed association, we examined the extent to which this relationship is unique rather than accounted for by executive functioning and physical health characteristics. 58 middle-to-older-aged community-dwelling adults without overt evidence of cognitive impairment (45-90 years old; 21 females) participated in the study. Each participant completed a 4-meter gait speed assessment and validated neuropsychological tests to examine various domains of executive functioning including working memory (i.e., Digit Span), inhibitory control (i.e., D-KEFS Color-Word Interference), and task switching (i.e., D-KEFS Number/Letter Switching). Multiple physical and vascular risk factors were also evaluated. Sustained attention was assessed using the gradual onset continuous performance task (gradCPT), a well-validated go/no-go sustained attention task. A series of linear regression models were used to examine how different aspects of cognition, including sustained attention and traditional measures of executive functioning, related to gait speed while controlling for a variety of physical and vascular risk factors. Among all predictors, gradCPT accuracy explained the most variance in gait speed ( = 0.19, < 0.001) and was the only significant predictor (β = 0.35, = 0.01) when accounting for executive functioning and other physical and vascular risk factors. The present results indicate that sustained attention may be uniquely sensitive and mechanistically linked to mobility limitations in middle-to-older adults.
尽管认知能力下降此前一直与行动能力受限和身体虚弱有关，但持续注意力与步速之间的关系尚未得到充分描述。为了更好地量化持续注意力与步速之间关联的特异性，我们研究了这种关系在多大程度上是独特的，而非由执行功能和身体健康特征所解释。58名无明显认知障碍迹象的中老年社区居民（45 - 90岁；21名女性）参与了该研究。每位参与者完成了一项4米步速评估以及经过验证的神经心理学测试，以检查执行功能的各个领域，包括工作记忆（即数字广度）、抑制控制（即D - KEFS颜色 - 单词干扰）和任务切换（即D - KEFS数字/字母切换）。还评估了多种身体和血管危险因素。使用逐渐开始连续作业任务（gradCPT）评估持续注意力，这是一项经过充分验证的“是/否”持续注意力任务。一系列线性回归模型用于研究认知的不同方面，包括持续注意力和执行功能的传统测量指标，在控制各种身体和血管危险因素的情况下与步速的关系。在所有预测因素中，gradCPT准确性解释了步速中最大的方差（ = 0.19， < 0.
