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The authors of this article confirm that all included literature review information is fully available without restrictions. Conflicts of Interest The authors declare that no conflicts of interest exist. Ethical Considerations Given this is a project-based literature review, based on an ongoing project by a university affiliated organization, no IRB was needed. No data is presented in this paper which has been derived from the participants and all program elements are publicly shared.

While prior research has demonstrated a relationship between sleep and cognitive performance, how sleep relates to underlying genetic and environmental etiologies contributing to cognitive functioning, regardless of the level of cognitive function, is unclear. The present study assessed whether the importance of genetic and environmental contributions to cognition vary depending on an individual’s aging-related sleep characteristics. The large sample consisted of twins from six studies within the Interplay of Genes and Environment across Multiple Studies (IGEMS) consortium spanning mid- to late-life (Average age (Mage)=57.6, range= 27 to 91 years, N=7052, Female=43.70%, 1525 complete monozygotic (MZ) pairs, 2001 complete dizygotic (DZ) pairs). Quantitative genetic twin models considered sleep duration as a primary moderator of genetic and environmental contributions to cognitive performance in four cognitive abilities (Semantic Fluency, Spatial-Visual Reasoning, Processing Speed, and Episodic Memory), while accounting for age moderation. Results suggested genetic and both shared and nonshared environmental contributions for Semantic Fluency and genetic and shared environmental contributions for Episodic Memory vary by sleep duration, while no significant moderation was observed for Spatial-Visual Reasoning or Processing Speed. Results for Semantic Fluency and Episodic Memory illustrated patterns of higher genetic influences on cognitive function at shorter sleep durations (i.e., 4 hours) and higher shared environmental contributions to cognitive function at longer sleep durations (i.e., 10 hours). Overall, these findings may align with associations of upregulation of neuroinflammatory processes and ineffective beta-amyloid clearance in short sleep contexts and common reporting of mental fatigue in long sleep contexts, both associated with poorer cognitive functioning.

Potential long-term health benefits may be afforded to grandparents in close contact with their grandchildren, although whether such benefits are visible on a day-to-day basis and among others in similar caretaking roles is unclear. We investigated how the quality and quantity of social contacts, as well as caretaker or grandparenting roles, may mediate symptom perceptions in day-to-day context in a consecutive six-day period. Older adults were recruited using an online survey service aged 59-88 years (Mage= 64.8, 55.8% grandparents, 67.8% female). Participants completed a baseline survey (N=152) followed by up to six daily surveys (N=85 of 152). Measures included daily positive and negative affect, and overall frequency of physical health symptoms. Daily social contacts were rated by participants in terms of importance/closeness of the contact. Last, participants indicated the degree of regular contact and non-custodial caretaking roles of children and their grandparent status. Findings indicated that grandparents tended to report daily contacts with closer social convoy members (B=1.40 (.437); p = .002). Moreover, a trend of reduced symptom reporting across days for grandparents was observed (B=-0.145 (.073), p=.048) adjusting for sex and age. Last, grandparents who regularly took care of their grandchildren and reported increased daily positive affect, reported fewer symptoms throughout the week (B=-0.326 (.139), p=0.02). Although modest, results indicate potentially important health benefits of grandparenting in terms of daily physical functioning that may play out over the longer term to impact health and well-being.