Spontaneous vs effortful cognition in typical and atypical ageing
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Spontaneous vs effortful cognitive processes in typical and atypical ageing: Implications for early diagnosis of Alzheimer’s disease
IRAS ID
247007
Contact name
Ioanna Markostamou
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
University of Hertfordshire
Duration of Study in the UK
1 years, 5 months, 1 days
Research summary
Research summary
Dementia has become a global challenge for the 21st century. Clinical diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease (AD) typically takes place at a stage when the neuropathological changes are well established and the therapeutic interventions have limited effectiveness. Current management attempts thus target the identification of individuals who are at risk of developing AD, including mild cognitive impairment (MCI) and subjective cognitive decline (SCD). While the patterns of impairment in effortful/strategic cognitive processes are well established in cognitive ageing and dementia, much less is known about spontaneous cognitive processes in typical and atypical ageing.
The project will systematically investigate the integrity of various aspects of spontaneous cognition in individuals with MCI, SCD, and healthy older adults (HOA) and contrast them against effortful/strategic processes. These aspects of spontaneous cognitive processes include (1) prospective memory – the ability to remember to do something in the future in response to cues, (2) involuntary autobiographical memories – the ability to spontaneously recall past personal experiences in response to incidental cues, and (3) retrieval of incidentally-encoded colour information. It is hypothesized that spontaneous/automatic cognitive processes will be relatively preserved in HOA but significantly disrupted in MCI and SCD. By contrast, it is expected that effortful/strategic cognitive operations will be impaired to some extent in all MCI, SCD, and HOA groups, when compared to healthy younger adults (HYA). A secondary objective will be to examine group differences in the extent and frequency of everyday memory errors. The project will employ both lab-based methods (i.e., standardized cognitive testing) as well as more naturalistic methods (standardized diaries).
Results will help identify possible impairments in spontaneous cognitive processes that uniquely characterise the preclinical AD stages of MCI and SCD. These in turn may serve as early cognitive markers of atypical ageing. The findings may also provide evidence-based recommendations for early intervention designs.
Lay summary of study results:
Dementia has become a global challenge for the 21st century. Clinical diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease (AD) typically takes place at a stage when the neuropathological changes are well established and the therapeutic interventions have limited effectiveness. Current management attempts thus target the identification of individuals who are at risk of developing AD, including individuals with mild cognitive impairment (MCI).
The effects of typical and atypical ageing on effortful/strategic cognitive processes, such as learning and remembering new information, are well described. However, much less is known about spontaneous/automatic cognitive processes in ageing. Spontaneous cognitive processes, such as having spontaneous thoughts about the past, are experienced without any deliberate effort or control, often in response to incidental cues (e.g., remembering a past holiday when seeing a TV advert).
Therefore, the present project systematically investigated potential changes in various processes of spontaneous cognition in typical ageing as well as in individuals with MCI and contrasted them against effortful/strategic processes. Results showed that automatic and effortless processes were well-maintained in healthy older adults when compared with younger adults, but significantly disrupted in older adults with MCI. By contrast, effortful/strategic cognitive operations were impaired in MCI as well as in healthy older adults, when compared to healthy younger adults.
The results help us identify possible impairments in spontaneous cognitive processes that uniquely characterise the preclinical AD stages of MCI. These in turn may serve as early cognitive markers of atypical ageing that could be used to objectively detect high-risk individuals for developing dementia.
REC name
London - Chelsea Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
18/LO/0953
Date of REC Opinion
21 May 2018
REC opinion
Favourable Opinion