The objective of this study was to translate and confirm the factor structure of the Familism Scale in the Brazilian Portuguese version. The sample included 716 Brazilian caregivers providing care to their own aging parents with Alzheimer’s Disease. The measures included the Familism Scale, the Filial Obligation Scale, the Life Satisfaction scale and the Center for Epidemiological Studies-Depression scale (CES-D). The questionnaire was individually filled online with use of the survey software package Qualtrics. Confirmatory Factor Analysis was used to examine the factor structure. The modified model demonstrated adequate fit (RMSEA = .063, CFI = .912). The hypotheses concerning convergence and divergence of validity from relevant variables were corroborated. These results support the use of the modified Familism Scale including twelve items and two factors with acceptable psychometric properties in a sample of Brazilian caregivers with Alzheimer’s Disease.

Objective: The vascular depression hypothesis posits that cerebrovascular burden confers risk for late-life depression. Though neuroanatomical correlates of vascular depression (prefrontal white matter hyperintensities) are well established, little is known about cognitive correlates; the identification of which may suggest therapeutic targets. Aims of this study are to examine the hypothesis that the relationship between cerebrovascular burden and depressive symptoms is moderated by brooding, a type of rumination. Method: A sample of 52 community-dwelling, stroke-free, individuals over the age of 70, without history of severe mental illness or dementia completed the Ruminative Responses Scale, and provided self-report (cardiac disease, hypertension, diabetes, high cholesterol) CVB data. The Geriatric Depression Scale was used to assess depressive symptomatology. Results: Results of a bootstrapped model were that self-reported measures of CVB predicted depressive symptomatology. This relationship was significantly moderated by brooding. Among older adults, those who self-reported high CVB and medium to elevated levels of rumination experienced disproportionately more depressive symptomatology. Conclusions: These findings suggest that brooding rumination may be one correlate of the vascular depression syndrome. Future research should examine neuroanatomical correlates of rumination among older adults, and further explore brooding as a therapeutic target for those with late-life depression.

Sleep quality relates to depressive symptom endorsement. The mechanisms relating these variables are not clearly elucidated, though inhibitory control and rumination are believed to play key roles. The current study aims to elucidate the relationship between sleep quality and depressive symptoms by examining the moderated mediating effect of inhibitory control and rumination. The sample included 41 community-dwelling older adults (age 70 and older). Measures included the Pittsburg Sleep Quality Inventory, a Stroop task (inhibitory control), the Ruminative Responses Scale, and the Geriatric Depression Scale. A series of bootstrapped models were employed to test hypotheses using a stepped approach. Poorer sleep quality was associated with higher rumination and depressive symptoms; however, these associations were no longer significant among older adults with higher inhibitory control. The association between sleep quality and depression was fully attenuated by rumination, and inhibitory control significantly moderated the association between sleep quality and rumination in the final model. Among community-dwelling older adults, the association between sleep quality and depression is mediated by rumination, and this effect is mitigated by inhibitory control. As such, these findings suggest that inhibitory control may be a relevant target for intervention in older adults with poor sleep quality, rumination, and depressive symptoms.

The Health and Retirement Study (HRS), a principal source for American public health research, has numerous global sister studies. Harmonization efforts seeking to establish measurement equivalence amongst these various datasets, is a critical prerequisite to cross-cultural research. Given well-known cultural variability in depressive symptom endorsement, the purpose of this study was to assess measurement invariance in a brief mood measure used in the HRS and the Mexican Health and Aging Study (MHAS). Total sample size using both groups was 15,319 participants (10,931 HRS; 4,388 MHAS) who were 65 and older from Waves 6 to 13 in the HRS and Waves 1 to 4 in the MHAS. MPlus Version 8.4 was used to conduct CFA analyses of measurement invariance. A contemporary approach with categorical data calls for examining threshold invariance first while establishing configural invariance, before examining invariance tests of thresholds, loadings, and intercepts in a second step. Results were that measurement invariance was not supported in this series of two steps with four out of six indices showing model fit in the first model and none of the indices showing model fit in the second model. These findings implied that there were differences in ways of responding to the brief mood measure between HRS and MHAS participants at the conceptual level. Thus, comparisons based on these measures may result in misleading findings and should be interpreted very conservatively. This study adds to the growing body of literature guiding harmonization efforts from the Program on Global Aging, Health and Policy.