The role of school education in time-dependent changes of cognitive abilities in cohorts from midlife to old age

Abstract

Objectives

It is examined whether older adults’ cognitive ability in terms of delayed recall and verbal fluency is improving over time, whether this occurs over all educational levels and both sexes, and whether these changes are due to increasing proportions of individuals with higher education.

Methods

Analyses are based on the German samples of the Survey on Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (waves 2004 and 2013).

Results

Achievement levels increased over time and in all age groups. Improvements over educational levels occurred in parallel, differences between educational levels in the earlier survey were later reproduced at higher levels. Increasing proportions of individuals with higher education did not explain improvements of cognitive ability. No sex differences emerged.

Conclusion

Improved cognitive abilities could not be explained by upward shifts of educational levels. Improvements in higher age groups may foster improved health status and prolonged self-determined life in the older population.

Keywords:

• Cognitive ability
• educational level
• SHARE-project
• temporal change
• aging
• psychological and social aspects
• dementia and cognitive disorders; mental health assessments
• epidemiology (mental health)
• cognitive functioning

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

The work reported in this paper was supported by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (German Research Foundation—DFG; project number GE1167/15-1 to Siegfried Geyer). The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.