Affect regulation and allostatic load over time.

Objective: Emerging work suggests that affect regulation strategies (e.g., active coping, anger expression) predict disease and mortality risk, with sometimes divergent estimates by sex or education levels.

General cognitive ability in high school, attained education, occupational complexity, and dementia risk.

Introduction: We address the extent to which adolescent cognition predicts dementia risk in later life, mediated by educational attainment and occupational complexity.

Methods: Using data from Project Talent Aging Study (PTAS), we fitted two structural equation models to test whether adolescent cognition predicts cognitive impairment (CI) and Ascertain Dementia 8 (AD8) status simultaneously (N = 2477) and AD8 alone (N = 6491) 60 years later, mediated by education and occupational complexity. Co-twin control analysis examined 82 discordant pairs for CI/AD8.

Positive life experiences and mortality: Examination of psychobiological pathways.

Introduction And Rationale: Positive life experiences are potentially-rewarding events and behaviors, such as social and romantic interactions, experiences of relaxation and physical comfort, time spent in nature, and other leisure activities. To date, there is limited evidence linking positive life experiences to long-term health outcomes.

Objective And Methods: The current study used data from N = 1243 participants in the Midlife Development in the US Study Biomarker Project to examine whether greater frequency of a range of different positive experiences and greater level of enjoyment of these experiences was linked to survival over a 12- to-16-year period in Cox proportional hazards models.

Cardiovascular variability, sociodemographics, and biomarkers of disease: the MIDUS study.

Like heart rate, blood pressure (BP) is not steady but varies over intervals as long as months to as short as consecutive cardiac cycles. This blood pressure variability (BPV) consists of regularly occurring oscillations as well as less well-organized changes and typically is computed as the standard deviation of multiple clinic visit-to-visit (VVV-BP) measures or from 24-h ambulatory BP recordings (ABPV). BP also varies on a beat-to-beat basis, quantified by methods that parse variation into discrete bins, e.

High school quality is associated with cognition 58 years later.

We leveraged a unique school-based longitudinal cohort-the Project Talent Aging Study-to examine whether attending higher quality schools is associated with cognitive performance among older adults in the United States (mean age = 74.8). Participants (n = 2,289) completed telephone neurocognitive testing.

Nature, Nurture, and the Meaning of Educational Attainment: Differences by Sex and Socioeconomic Status.

Estimated heritability of educational attainment (EA) varies widely, from 23% to 80%, with growing evidence suggesting the degree to which genetic variation contributes to individual differences in EA is highly dependent upon situational factors. We aimed to decompose EA into influences attributable to genetic propensity and to environmental context and their interplay, while considering influences of rearing household economic status (HES) and sex. We use the Project Talent Twin and Sibling Study, drawn from the population-representative cohort of high school students assessed in 1960 and followed through 2014, to ages 68-72.

Socioeconomic status, positive experiences, and allostatic load.

Objective: Socioeconomic disparities in physiological well-being may be a pathway to the poorer health outcomes observed in those of lower socioeconomic status (SES). The present research examined greater frequency of positive life experiences (POS) as a route through which greater cumulative SES (CSES) may be linked to lower allostatic load (AL), a multisystem index of physiological dysregulation, and assessed whether the association between POS and AL varies along the socioeconomic spectrum.

Method: These associations were examined using data from the Midlife Development in the United States Biomarker Project (N = 2,096).

Ambient air pollution exposure and increasing depressive symptoms in older women: The mediating role of the prefrontal cortex and insula.

Exposures to fine particulate matter (PM) and nitrogen dioxide (NO) have been associated with the emergence of depressive symptoms in older adulthood, although most studies used cross-sectional outcome measures. Elucidating the brain structures mediating the adverse effects can strengthen the causal role between air pollution and increasing depressive symptoms. We evaluated whether smaller volumes of brain structures implicated in late-life depression mediate associations between ambient air pollution exposure and changes in depressive symptoms.

Associations Between Air Pollution Exposure and Empirically Derived Profiles of Cognitive Performance in Older Women.

Background: Elucidating associations between exposures to ambient air pollutants and profiles of cognitive performance may provide insight into neurotoxic effects on the aging brain.

Objective: We examined associations between empirically derived profiles of cognitive performance and residential concentrations of particulate matter of aerodynamic diameter < 2.5 (PM2.

Perceived neighborhood cohesion buffers COVID-19 impacts on mental health in a United States sample.

Objective: This study examined whether perceived neighborhood cohesion (the extent to which neighbors trust and count on one another) buffers against the mental health effects of the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic.

Methods: The XXX University National COVID-19 and Mental Health Study surveyed US adults (N = 3965; M age = 39 years), measuring depressive symptoms, staying home more during than before the 2020 pandemic, and perceived neighborhood cohesion.

Results: A series of linear regressions indicated that perceiving one's neighborhood as more cohesive was not only associated with fewer depressive symptoms, but also attenuated the relationship between spending more time at home during the pandemic and depressive symptoms.

Racial/Ethnic Disparities in Alzheimer's Disease Risk: Role of Exposure to Ambient Fine Particles.

Background: Whether racial/ethnic disparities in Alzheimer's disease (AD) risk may be explained by ambient fine particles (PM2.5) has not been studied.

Method: We conducted a prospective, population-based study on a cohort of Black (n = 481) and White (n = 6 004) older women (aged 65-79) without dementia at enrollment (1995-1998).

Can I Buy My Health? A Genetically Informed Study of Socioeconomic Status and Health.

Background: A large literature demonstrates associations between socioeconomic status (SES) and health, including physiological health and well-being. Moreover, gender differences are often observed among measures of both SES and health. However, relationships between SES and health are sometimes questioned given the lack of true experiments, and the potential biological and SES mechanisms explaining gender differences in health are rarely examined simultaneously.

Outdoor air pollution exposure and inter-relation of global cognitive performance and emotional distress in older women.

The interrelationships among long-term ambient air pollution exposure, emotional distress and cognitive decline in older adulthood remain unclear. Long-term exposure may impact cognitive performance and subsequently impact emotional health. Conversely, exposure may initially be associated with emotional distress followed by declines in cognitive performance.

Air Pollution and the Dynamic Association Between Depressive Symptoms and Memory in Oldest-Old Women.

Background/objectives: Exposure to air pollution may contribute to both increasing depressive symptoms and decreasing episodic memory in older adulthood, but few studies have examined this hypothesis in a longitudinal context. Accordingly, we examined the association between air pollution and changes in depressive symptoms (DS) and episodic memory (EM) and their interrelationship in oldest-old (aged 80 and older) women.

Design: Prospective cohort data from the Women's Health Initiative Memory Study-Epidemiology of Cognitive Health Outcomes.

The Project Talent Twin and Sibling Study: Zygosity and New Data Collection.

The Project Talent Twin and Sibling (PTTS) study includes 4481 multiples and their 522 nontwin siblings from 2233 families. The sample was drawn from Project Talent, a U.S.

Association Between Socioeconomic Status Mobility and Inflammation Markers Among White and Black Adults in the United States: A Latent Class Analysis.

Objective: This article examines whether multidimensional indicators of objective and subjective socioeconomic status (SES) across the life course can be categorized into latent classes of SES mobility and tests the associations of these categories with inflammation markers among white and black adults.

Methods: Data are from 592 non-Hispanic white and 158 non-Hispanic black participants who completed both the baseline survey and biomarkers assessment of the Midlife in the United States Refresher study. Groups of different SES mobility were examined using latent class analysis.

Social stratification and allostatic load: shapes of health differences in the MIDUS study in the United States.

Social stratification is an important mechanism of human organization that helps to explain health differences between demographic groups commonly associated with socioeconomic gradients. Individuals, or group of individuals, with similar health profiles may have had different stratification experiences. This is particularly true as social stratification is a significant non-measurable source of systematic unobservable differences in both SES indicators and health statuses of disadvantage.

Impact of Experience Corps® Participation on Children's Academic Achievement and School Behavior.

This article reports on the impact of the Experience Corps® (EC) Baltimore program, an intergenerational, school-based program aimed at improving academic achievement and reducing disruptive school behavior in urban, elementary school students in Kindergarten through third grade (K-3). Teams of adult volunteers aged 60 and older were placed in public schools, serving 15 h or more per week, to perform meaningful and important roles to improve the educational outcomes of children and the health and well-being of volunteers. Findings indicate no significant impact of the EC program on standardized reading or mathematical achievement test scores among children in grades 1-3 exposed to the program.

Dual Versus Single Parental Households and Differences in Maternal Mental Health and Child's Overweight/Obesity.

Objectives Mothers report higher levels of psychological stress than fathers. s. Psychological stress is posited to influence parenting practices that could increase children's obesity risk.

Advancing Research on Psychosocial Stress and Aging with the Health and Retirement Study: Looking Back to Launch the Field Forward.

Objectives: The Health and Retirement Study (HRS) was designed as an interdisciplinary study with a strong focus on health, retirement, and socioeconomic environment, to study their dynamic relationships over time in a sample of mid-life adults. The study includes validated self-report measures and individual items that capture the experiences of stressful events (stressor exposures) and subjective assessments of stress (perceived stress) within specific life domains.

Methods: This article reviews and catalogs the peer-reviewed publications that have used the HRS to examine associations between psychosocial stress measures and psychological, physical health, and economic outcomes.

Failure to Meet Generative Self-Expectations is Linked to Poorer Cognitive-Affective Well-Being.

Objectives: Generativity, or concern with contributing to others, is theorized to be an important goal of mid-to-late life. Greater self-perceptions of generativity are associated with better well-being over time. The aim of this study is to examine how generative self-perceptions and failure to meet generative expectations over time are linked to specific cognitive-affective states (feelings of connectedness, self-worth, and positive affect), and consequently, life satisfaction.

Neighborhood cohesion, neighborhood disorder, and cardiometabolic risk.

Perceptions of neighborhood disorder (trash, vandalism) and cohesion (neighbors trust one another) are related to residents' health. Affective and behavioral factors have been identified, but often in studies using geographically select samples. We use a nationally representative sample (n = 9032) of United States older adults from the Health and Retirement Study to examine cardiometabolic risk in relation to perceptions of neighborhood cohesion and disorder.

Discrimination and anger control as pathways linking socioeconomic disadvantage to allostatic load in midlife.

Objective: Recent evidence suggests that experiences of discrimination contribute to socioeconomic status health disparities. The current study examined if the experience and regulation of anger-an expected emotional response to discrimination-serves as an explanatory factor for the previously documented links between socioeconomic disadvantage (SED), discrimination, and allostatic load.

Methods: Data were drawn from the second wave of the Midlife in the United States (MIDUS) study and included 909 adults who participated in the biomarkers subproject.