Normative Data for Elderly Adults: The Maine-Syracuse Study

Abstract

The primary objective of this study was to provide supplementary normative data on aging and cognition from an ongoing community-based study. This dementia- and stroke-free sample (age range = 70–89; mean = 77.5) consisted of 228 women and 155 men participating in the Maine-Syracuse Longitudinal Study at waves 6 to 7 (2001–2009). The authors employed a battery of 23 widely utilized clinical cognitive tests. In this cross-sectional study, the authors focus on subjects 70 to 79 (n = 248) and 80 to 89 (n = 135) years old, and provide preliminary data for a smaller number of subjects aged 90 to 98 years old (n = 14). More highly educated and younger participants exhibited better performance on cognitive tests. Education was not significantly associated with every cognitive outcome, nor was age cohort membership. The addition of cardiovascular disease (CVD)/health variables to a model including age, education, and gender main effects provided statistically significant increases in R² (range = .021–.084) of performance on some tests. Results are discussed in relation to this study's value with respect to determining cognitive impairment in individuals free from probable dementia or stroke.

Acknowledgments

This work was supported by National Institute on Aging project AG03055 of the National Institutes of Health and the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute projects HL67358 and HL81290.

Notes

^a Minorities include African Americans, American Indians, Alaskan Natives, nonwhite Hispanics, and Asian/Pacific Islanders.

^b Depressed Mood based on a CES-D score of 16 or more.

^c Hypertension is defined as SBP of 140 mm Hg or more, DBP of 90 mm Hg or more, or treatment with antihypertensive medications.

^d Coronary heart disease.

^e Transient ischemic attack.

^f Obesity is defined as a body mass index of 30 or more.

^g Myocardial infarction.

Note. Unless specified otherwise, all scores are expressed as number correct or total score.

^†Possible value not determinable by the test design.

^§Scores expressed in seconds; NTL = no time limit.

^a Derived score.

^b Trail Making Difference = Trail Making B − Trail Making A.

^c Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale (Wechsler, 1955).

^d Halstead-Reitan Battery (Reitan & Wolfson, 1993).

^e Wechsler Memory Scale—Revised (Wechsler, 1987).

^f Multilingual Aphasia Examination (Benton & Hamsher, 1976).

^g Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale—III (Wechsler, 1997).

^h HVOT (Hooper, 1958).

ⁱ HVLT (Brandt, 1991).

^j MMSE (Folstein, Folstein & McHugh 1975).

Note. See Table 2 for units of measurement for each test.

*Blank cells reflect meaningless scores due to skewed distribution; employ median and lower quartile for indication of poor performance.

^a Hooper Visual Organization Test.

^b Controlled Oral Word Association.

^c Mini-Mental State Examination.

^d Hopkins Verbal Learning Test.

Note. See Table 2 for units of measurement for each test.

*Blank cells reflect meaningless scores due to skewed distribution; employ median and lower quartile for indication of poor performance.

^a Hooper Visual Organization Test.

^b Controlled Oral Word Association.

^c Mini-Mental State Examination.

^d Hopkins Verbal Learning Test.

Note. Age, education, and gender were controlled for each other and the two- and three-way interactions.

*p < .05; **p < .01; ***p < .001.

^a Disease variables (DV) = CVD risk and disease variables (all yes/no): MI, diabetes mellitus, TIA, CHD, hypertension, smoker, obesity.

^b CESD = depressive symptoms (score on the Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale).

*p < .05; **p < .01; ***p < .001.

Note. See Table 2 for units of measurement for each test.

^a Blank cells reflect meaningless scores due to skewed distribution; employ median and lower quartile for indication of poor performance.

^b R ² for age group effect unadjusted for other covariates.

*p < .05; **p < .01; ***p < .001.

*Includes individuals aged 85 to 100.