How Welfare Regimes Moderate the Associations Between Cognitive Aging, Education, and Occupation.

Objectives: Previous studies have shown the importance of individual markers of cognitive reserve, such as education and occupation, for cognitive health in old age. However, there has been only little investigation so far on how this relationship varies across contexts.

Methods: We analyzed data from the Survey of Health, Ageing, and Retirement in Europe, using second-order latent growth models, to assess the moderating role of welfare regimes on the relationship between education and occupation skill level in explaining overall cognitive functioning and decline in old age.

Do Welfare Regimes Moderate Cumulative Dis/advantages Over the Life Course? Cross-National Evidence from Longitudinal SHARE Data.

Objectives: This study aimed to examine the cumulative disadvantage of different forms of childhood misfortune and adult-life socioeconomic conditions (SEC) with regard to trajectories and levels of self-rated health in old age and whether these associations differed between welfare regimes (Scandinavian, Bismarckian, Southern European, and Eastern European).

Method: The study included 24,004 respondents aged 50-96 from the longitudinal SHARE survey. Childhood misfortune included childhood SEC, adverse childhood experiences, and adverse childhood health experiences.

The Social Support-Health Link Unraveled: Pathways Linking Social Support to Functional Capacity in Later Life.

Despite evidence that social support is strongly related to health, very little is known about the mechanisms underlying this association. This study investigates whether physical activity, depressive symptoms, and chronic diseases mediate the associations between social support and functional capacity. Data from the Longitudinal Aging Study Amsterdam on 954 participants, aged 75 and older, covering 9 years, are analyzed with latent growth mediation models.

Advantaged socioeconomic conditions in childhood are associated with higher cognitive functioning but stronger cognitive decline in older age.

Cognitive aging is characterized by large heterogeneity, which may be due to variations in childhood socioeconomic conditions (CSC). Although there is substantial evidence for an effect of CSC on levels of cognitive functioning at older age, results on associations with cognitive decline are mixed. We examined by means of an accelerated longitudinal design the association between CSC and cognitive trajectories from 50 to 96 years.

Welfare regimes modify the association of disadvantaged adult-life socioeconomic circumstances with self-rated health in old age.

Background: Welfare regimes in Europe modify individuals' socioeconomic trajectories over their life-course, and, ultimately, the link between socioeconomic circumstances (SECs) and health. This paper aimed to assess whether the associations between life-course SECs (early-life, young adult-life, middle-age and old-age) and risk of poor self-rated health (SRH) trajectories in old age are modified by welfare regimes (Scandinavian [SC], Bismarckian [BM], Southern European [SE], Eastern European [EE]).

Methods: We used data from the longitudinal SHARE survey.

Does stimulating various coping strategies alleviate loneliness? Results from an online friendship enrichment program.

Loneliness stems from a mismatch between the social relationships one has and those one desires. Loneliness often has severe consequences for individuals and society. Recently, an online adaptation of the friendship enrichment program (FEP) was developed and tested to gain insight in its contribution to the alleviation of loneliness.

Trust: an essential condition in the application of a caregiver support intervention in nursing practice.

Background: The recent policy of deinstitutionalization of health care in Western countries has resulted in a growing number of people - including elderly - with severe mental illness living in the community where they rely on families and others for support in daily living. Caregiving for partners, parents, children, and significant others can be a stressful experience and has been associated with psychosocial problems and poorer physical health. To support caregivers, a new, complex, nurse-led caregiver - centered intervention was developed.

The Theory of Planned Behavior and Physical Activity Change: Outcomes of the Aging Well and Healthily Intervention Program for Older Adults.

The predictive value of the Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB) on intention and physical activity (PA) over time was examined. Data from the Aging Well and Healthily intervention program (targeting perceived behavioral control and attitude, not subjective norm) were analyzed, including pretest (T0), posttest (T1, except subjective norm) and 4-6 months follow-up (T2, PA outcomes only) (N = 387, M age 72 years). Structural equation modeling was used to test a TPB model.

Ten-Year Course of Cosmic Transcendence in Older Adults in the Netherlands.

Objectives Gerotranscendence is defined as a transition from a materialistic and rationalistic perspective to a more cosmic and transcendent view of life accompanying the aging process. Would gerotranscendence levels still increase in later life? The current prospective study investigates 10-year trajectories of cosmic transcendence (a core dimension of gerotranscendence). Methods Four interview cycles of the Longitudinal Aging Study Amsterdam with 3-year intervals from 1995 to 2006 provide data on cosmic transcendence, demographics (ages 57-85), religiousness, health, sense of mastery, and humor coping.

The Effects of Life Events and Socioeconomic Position in Childhood and Adulthood on Successful Aging.

Objectives: Building on social stress theory, this study has 2 aims. First, we aim to estimate the effects of stressful life events in childhood and adulthood on Successful Aging (SA). Second, we examine how unequal exposure to such life events between individuals with different socioeconomic position (SEP) contributes to socioeconomic inequalities in SA.

Temporal Relationship Between Cognitive and Physical Performance in Middle-Aged to Oldest Old People.

Background: Cognitive and physical impairment frequently co-occur in older people. The aim of this study was to assess the temporal order of these age-related changes in cognitive and physical performance and to assess whether a relationship was different across specific cognitive and physical domains and age groups.

Methods: Cognitive domains included global, executive, and memory function; physical domains included gait speed and handgrip strength.

Late-life depression symptom dimensions and cognitive functioning in the Longitudinal Aging Study Amsterdam (LASA).

Background: Depression often co-occurs in late-life in the context of declining cognitive functions, but it is not clear whether specific depression symptom dimensions are differentially associated with cognitive abilities.

Methods: The study sample comprised 3107 community-dwelling older adults from the Longitudinal Aging Study Amsterdam (LASA). We applied a Multiple Indicators Multiple Causes (MIMIC) model to examine the association between cognitive abilities and latent dimensions of the Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale (CES-D), while accounting for differential item functioning (DIF) due to age, gender and cognitive function levels.

Socioeconomic inequalities in a 16-year longitudinal measurement of successful ageing.

Background: This study examines to what extent education, occupation and income are associated with the multidimensional process of successful ageing, encompassing trajectories of physical, mental and social functioning in old age.

Methods: We employed 16-year longitudinal data from 2095 participants aged 55-85 years at baseline in the Dutch, nationally representative Longitudinal Aging Study Amsterdam. For 9 indicators of successful ageing, separate Latent Class Growth models were used to identify subgroups of older adults with a 'successful' trajectory.

Diversity in Older Adults' Care Networks: The Added Value of Individual Beliefs and Social Network Proximity.

Objectives: Policy reforms in long-term care require an increased share of informal caregivers in elderly care. This may be more feasible for older adults who (believe they) can organize the care themselves and have a local social network. This study describes care network types, how they vary in the share of informal caregivers, and examines associations with characteristics of community-dwelling older adults, including individual beliefs and network proximity.

Adverse effects of frailty on social functioning in older adults: Results from the Longitudinal Aging Study Amsterdam.

Objectives: The aim of this study was to examine the association between physical frailty and social functioning among older adults, cross-sectionally and prospectively over 3 years.

Study Design: The study sample consisted of 1115 older adults aged 65 and over from two waves of the Longitudinal Aging Study Amsterdam, a population based study.

Main Outcome Measures: Frailty was measured at T1 (2005/2006) using the criteria of the frailty phenotype, which includes weight loss, weak grip strength, exhaustion, slow gait speed and low physical activity.

Capturing the Diversity of Successful Aging: An Operational Definition Based on 16-Year Trajectories of Functioning.

Purpose Of The Study: To determine the prevalence and extent of successful aging (SA) when various suggestions proposed in the previous literature for improving models of SA are incorporated into one holistic operational definition. These suggestions include defining and measuring SA as a developmental process, including subjective indicators alongside more objective ones, and expressing SA on a continuum.

Design And Methods: Data were used from 2,241 respondents in the Longitudinal Aging Study Amsterdam, a multidisciplinary study in a nationally representative sample of older adults in the Netherlands.

Mental health nurses' support to caregivers of older adults with severe mental illness: a qualitative study.

Background: Literature has shown the serious impact of severe mental illness on the daily life of caregivers. We studied reported caregiver support practices by mental health nurses for use in the development of a nursing intervention. We aimed to explore current caregiver support practices by mental health nurses.

The mix matters: complex personal networks relate to higher cognitive functioning in old age.

Stronger engagement of older adults in social activities and greater embeddedness in networks is often argued to buffer cognitive decline and lower risks of dementia. One of the explanations is that interaction with other people trains the brain, thereby enhancing cognitive functioning. However, research on the relationship between personal networks and cognitive functioning is not yet conclusive.

The relationships between ADHD and social functioning and participation in older adults in a population-based study.

Objective: To examine the associations between ADHD and social functioning and participation among older adults.

Method: Data were used from the Longitudinal Aging Study Amsterdam (LASA). In 2008/2009, respondents were asked about social functioning and participation.

Aging in the Netherlands: state of the art and science.

The population of the Netherlands is aging, although it is still relatively young in comparison with the population of most other European countries. As Dutch society transitions from a welfare state to a society based more on individual responsibility, the increasingly well-educated and financially well-off elderly people wish to exert more control over their own lives. Research and education in the field of aging have grown rapidly over the past few decades, along with variety in research focus and methodology.

Longitudinal mediation of processing speed on age-related change in memory and fluid intelligence.

Age-related decline in processing speed has long been considered a key driver of cognitive aging. While the majority of empirical evidence for the processing speed hypothesis has been obtained from analyses of between-person age differences, longitudinal studies provide a direct test of within-person change. Using recent developments in longitudinal mediation analysis, we examine the speed-mediation hypothesis at both the within-and between-person levels in two longitudinal studies, Longitudinal Aging Study Amsterdam (LASA) and Origins of Variance in the Oldest-Old (OCTO-Twin).