Declarative verbal memory impairments in middle-aged women who are caregivers of offspring with autism spectrum disorders: The role of negative affect and testosterone

Abstract

Caring for offspring diagnosed with a chronic psychological disorder such as autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is used in research as a model of chronic stress. This chronic stress has been reported to have deleterious effects on caregivers' cognition, particularly in verbal declarative memory. Moreover, such cognitive decline may be mediated by testosterone (T) levels and negative affect, understood as depressive mood together with high anxiety and anger. This study aimed to compare declarative memory function in middle-aged women who were caregivers for individuals with ASD (n = 24; mean age = 45) and female controls (n = 22; mean age = 45), using a standardised memory test (Rey's Auditory Verbal Learning Test). It also sought to examine the role of care recipient characteristics, negative mood and T levels in memory impairments. ASD caregivers were highly sensitive to proactive interference and verbal forgetting. In addition, they had higher negative affect and T levels, both of which have been associated with poorer verbal memory performance. Moreover, the number of years of caregiving affected memory performance and negative affect, especially, in terms of anger feelings. On the other hand, T levels in caregivers had a curvilinear relationship with verbal memory performance; that is, increases in T were associated with improvements in verbal memory performance up to a certain point, but subsequently, memory performance decreased with increasing T. Chronic stress may produce disturbances in mood and hormonal levels, which in turn might increase the likelihood of developing declarative memory impairments although caregivers do not show a generalised decline in memory. These findings should be taken into account for understanding the impact of cognitive impairments on the ability to provide optimal caregiving.

Keywords:

• Autism spectrum disorders
• Caregiver
• Declarative memory
• Testosterone
• Women

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Education [PSI2008-04408/PSIC] and the Science Policy Unit at the Department of Education of the Valencian regional government [ACOMP/2010/250], [PROMETEO/2011/048], [ISIC/2013/001], [ACIF/2011/075]. These funders had no further role in the study design; in the collection, analysis and interpretation of the data; in the writing of the paper; or in the decision to submit it for publication.