Education and Cognitive Functioning Across the Life Span

Abstract

Cognitive abilities are important predictors of educational and occupational performance, socioeconomic attainment, health, and longevity. Declines in cognitive abilities are linked to impairments in older adults’ everyday functions, but people differ from one another in their rates of cognitive decline over the course of adulthood and old age. Hence, identifying factors that protect against compromised late-life cognition is of great societal interest. The number of years of formal education completed by individuals is positively correlated with their cognitive function throughout adulthood and predicts lower risk of dementia late in life. These observations have led to the propositions that prolonging education might (a) affect cognitive ability and (b) attenuate aging-associated declines in cognition. We evaluate these propositions by reviewing the literature on educational attainment and cognitive aging, including recent analyses of data harmonized across multiple longitudinal cohort studies and related meta-analyses. In line with the first proposition, the evidence indicates that educational attainment has positive effects on cognitive function. We also find evidence that cognitive abilities are associated with selection into longer durations of education and that there are common factors (e.g., parental socioeconomic resources) that affect both educational attainment and cognitive development. There is likely reciprocal interplay among these factors, and among cognitive abilities, during development. Education–cognitive ability associations are apparent across the entire adult life span and across the full range of education levels, including (to some degree) tertiary education. However, contrary to the second proposition, we find that associations between education and aging-associated cognitive declines are negligible and that a threshold model of dementia can account for the association between educational attainment and late-life dementia risk. We conclude that educational attainment exerts its influences on late-life cognitive function primarily by contributing to individual differences in cognitive skills that emerge in early adulthood but persist into older age. We also note that the widespread absence of educational influences on rates of cognitive decline puts constraints on theoretical notions of cognitive aging, such as the concepts of cognitive reserve and brain maintenance. Improving the conditions that shape development during the first decades of life carries great potential for improving cognitive ability in early adulthood and for reducing public-health burdens related to cognitive aging and dementia.

The Impact of Two MMPI-2-Based Models of Personality in Predicting Driving Behavior. Can Demographic Variables Be Disregarded?

“…Education offers enriching experiences that improve domain-general cognitive skills such as processing speed, working memory, reasoning, and cognitive control [ 144 , 145 , 146 ]. It has been argued that the effects of education on cognitive functioning are evident across the lifespan, influencing individual differences in cognitive skills that appear in adulthood and persist with aging [ 147 ]. A few studies have investigated the effect of the level of education on cognitive abilities that are crucial for the fitness to drive.…”

Sleep disturbances and dementia risk: A multicenter study

“…It is, therefore, possible that individuals with a higher reserve capacity also experience steeper decline once they begin to decline . Higher education has been suggested as protecting against cognitive decline in some studies (Christensen et al, 2009;Stern, 2002), but several recent studies have suggested that education increases cognitive performance, but does not protect against cognitive decline thereafter (Cadar et al, 2017;Lovden et al, 2020;Piccinin et al, 2013;Seblova et al, 2020).…”

The Relationship between Life Course Socioeconomic Conditions and Objective and Subjective Memory in Older Age

“…For this purpose, an increasing number of studies have started to explore the role of socioeconomic conditions in childhood, across adulthood, or in late-life for interindividual differences in middle-aged and older adults’ cognitive functioning (e.g., [ 3 , 4 ]). In detail, low socioeconomic status or indicators of disadvantageous socioeconomic conditions across the life course, such as low parental socioeconomic conditions in childhood (e.g., [ 5 , 6 ]), low level of education [ 7 , 8 , 9 ] or low income [ 8 ], have a negative impact on late-life cognitive performance and are associated with cognitive decline in aging (but also see [ 5 , 10 , 11 ]). Conceptually, one explanation may be that favorable life course socioeconomic conditions are thought to be associated with more stimulating activities and thus being involved in building up of cognitive reserve throughout the lifespan [ 12 , 13 ].…”

“…Conceptually, one explanation may be that favorable life course socioeconomic conditions are thought to be associated with more stimulating activities and thus being involved in building up of cognitive reserve throughout the lifespan [ 12 , 13 ]. This reserve could lead to better health in later life [ 14 ] and particularly, through structural and functional brain differences, buffer against cognitive impairments and early cognitive decline [ 5 , 10 , 11 ]. Indeed, different studies show that indicators of socioeconomic conditions are related to structural brain change (e.g., hippocampus volume and frontal cortex) as well as functional brain activity (e.g., differing activation in the network of prefrontal, frontal, hippocampus and parietal working memory areas), showing up at different life course stages and various cognitive functions (i.e., executive function, memory and language) [ 15 , 16 ].…”