Incorporating ecological momentary assessment into multimethod investigations of cognitive aging: Promise and practical considerations

Capturing cognitive capacity in the everyday environment across a continuum of cognitive decline using a smartwatch n-back task and ecological momentary assessment

OBJECTIVE

Cognitive testing using mobile technologies can assist with early detection of cognitive decline. We use ecological momentary assessment to investigate the feasibility, reliability, and validity of a smartwatch n-back task (1-back) delivered to adults across the cognitive continuum.

METHOD

One hundred seventy-four community-dwelling individuals (Mage = 70.51) representing healthy older adults, individuals with subjective cognitive decline, and mild cognitive impairment completed a neurocognitive assessment battery and wore a smartwatch for 7+ days. Participants were prompted 4 times per day to complete an n-back task on the smartwatch.

RESULTS

Across all groups, findings indicated an acceptable task adherence rate (> 78%; n = 174) and response rate (> 89%; n = 158 n-back analysis sample). Supporting external validity, participants with mild cognitive impairment were less accurate, had fewer total correct responses, and performed at lower initial levels than both healthy older adults and subjective cognitive decline, ω²s > .09. Intraindividual variability was greater for the mild cognitive impairment group compared to healthy older adults, but subjective cognitive decline did not differ significantly from either group, ω² = .12. For discriminant and convergent validity, n-back total correct correlated with performance on standardized assessments of executive attention, whereas intraindividual variability correlated with real-world factors (i.e., context, everyday function). Reliability assessment revealed stability for n-back measures after four to six posttraining trials and excellent test-retest reliability for total correct after 5 months. Finally, combining n-back and clinical measures improved classification accuracy.

CONCLUSIONS

Findings suggest the smartwatch n-back task is feasible for collecting cognitive data across the cognitive continuum with demonstrated reliability and validity in the everyday environment using ecological momentary assessment. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved).

Cognotoxemia: endotoxemia and gender predict changes in working memory performance in healthy adults

Introduction

Examining the contribution of peripheral systems to cognitive function under healthy circumstances may improve our understanding of the systems that confer risk or resilience in diseased states. Endotoxemia-a pro-inflammatory response to the translocation of bacteria that reside in the gut on other sources (e.g., respiratory tract; infection) into the blood-was hypothesized to relate to worsened cognitive functioning. Gender was explored as a moderator.

Methods

A sample of 162 healthy adults (25-65 years old) provided plasma, from which a measure of endotoxemia was determined [i.e., the ratio of lipopolysaccharide binding protein (LBP) to soluble cluster of differentiation 14 receptors (sCD14)]. Participants performed an array of laboratory and ambulatory cognitive tasks at three timepoints, each separated by 9 months. Two sets of multilevel models were used: Prospective models, linking endotoxemia at baseline with changes in cognition across time, and coupling models, which examine correlations of endotoxemia with cognition across time.

Results

A prospective model indicated lower levels of endotoxemia at baseline predicted improvements in working memory across the three timepoints; higher levels were associated with no change in cognitive performance. Gender was not found to modulate this finding. Interestingly, a coupling analysis of endotoxemia and gender across time showed that in men, those with higher endotoxemia performed better at the working memory task overall; in women, working memory performance was similar regardless of endotoxemia level.

Conclusion

This work provides initial evidence that endotoxemia may be associated with a dampening of improvement in working memory, improvement consistent with practice effects, which should be expected in a sample of healthy, relatively young adults. The findings also provide preliminary evidence that, at least for men, higher degrees of endotoxemia are not inherently negative, and may link with short term positive outcomes for working memory.

Examining resilience to Alzheimer's disease through the lens of monoaminergic neuromodulator systems

The monoaminergic nuclei are thought to be some of the earliest sites of Alzheimer's disease (AD) pathology in the brain, with tau-containing pretangles appearing in these nuclei decades before the onset of clinical impairments. It has increasingly been recognized that monoamine systems represent a critical target of investigation towards understanding the progression of AD and designing early detection and treatment approaches. This review synthesizes evidence across animal studies, human neuropathology, and state-of-the-art neuroimaging and daily life assessment methods in humans, which demonstrate robust relationships between monoamine systems and AD pathophysiology and behavior. Further, the review highlights the promise of multimethod, multisystem approaches to studying monoaminergic mechanisms of resilience to AD pathology.

The transition to grandparenthood: No consistent evidence for change in the Big Five personality traits and life satisfaction

Intergenerational relations have received close attention in the context of population aging and increased childcare provision by grandparents. However, few studies have investigated the psychological consequences of becoming a grandparent. In a preregistered test of grandparenthood as a developmental task in middle and older adulthood, we used representative panel data from the Netherlands ( N = 563) and the United States ( N = 2210) to analyze first-time grandparents’ personality and life satisfaction development. We tested gender, employment, and grandchild care as moderators. To address confounding, we employed propensity score matching using two procedures: matching grandparents with parents and nonparents to achieve balance in different sets of carefully selected covariates. Multilevel models demonstrated mean-level stability of the Big Five personality traits and life satisfaction over the transition to grandparenthood, and no consistent moderation effects—contrary to the social investment principle. The few small effects of grandparenthood on personality development did not replicate across samples. We found no evidence of larger inter-individual differences in change in grandparents compared to the controls or of lower rank-order stability. Our findings add to recent critical re-examinations of the social investment principle and are discussed in light of characteristics that might moderate grandparents’ personality development.