•Bipolar patients displayed worse subjective cognitive functioning than healthy controls.•Subjective cognition correlated to job status, psychosocial functioning and suicidal ideation.•Subjective ...cognition could predict psychosocial functioning and suicidal ideation.•Depressed symptoms moderated relation between objective cognitive functioning and suicidal ideation.
Persistent cognitive deficits are prevalent during all stages of bipolar disorder (BD). However, few studies have examined subjective cognitive complaints in patients with BD. This study aimed to investigate the prevalence and relevant factors of subjective cognitive functioning and its potential effects on predicting psychosocial functioning and suicidal ideation in BD. Ninety-two patients with BD type I (including 42 depressed patients and 50 euthymic patients) and 60 healthy individuals were recruited for this study. All participants were assessed with a battery of neuropsychological tests examining attention and processing speed, visual memory, working memory and executive functions, as well as the Cognitive Complaints in Bipolar Disorder Rating Assessment, the Global Assessment of Functioning scale and the Beck Scale for Suicide Ideation. Bipolar patients exhibited worse subjective cognitive dysfunction compared with healthy individuals, and depressed patients expressed more cognitive complaints than euthymic bipolar patients. In bipolar group, psychosocial functioning, suicidal ideation and occupational status were the main relevant factors of subjective cognitive functioning. Subjective cognitive functioning could also predict psychosocial functioning and suicidal ideation. Depressive symptoms moderated the associations between objective cognitive functioning and suicidal ideation, but could not moderate the correlations between cognitive functioning and psychosocial functioning. These findings suggest that subjective cognitive assessment should be further emphasized in clinical practice.
The heterogeneity of cognitive profiles among psychiatric patients has been reported to carry significant clinical information. However, how to best characterize such cognitive heterogeneity is still ...a matter of debate. Despite being well suited for clinical data, cluster analysis techniques, like the Two-Step and the Latent Class, received little to no attention in the literature. The present study aimed to test the validity of the cluster solutions obtained with Two-Step and Latent Class cluster analysis on the cognitive profile of a cross-diagnostic sample of 387 psychiatric inpatients. Two-Step and Latent Class cluster analysis produced similar and reliable solutions. The overall results reported that it is possible to group all psychiatric inpatients into Low and High Cognitive Profiles, with a higher degree of cognitive heterogeneity in schizophrenia and bipolar disorder patients than in depressive disorders and personality disorder patients.
•About 72% of BD patients (n = 101) showed subjective cognitive deficits in all phases.•Subjective and objective cognitive functioning were weakly associated in euthymic BD.•Subjective and objective ...cognitive functioning did not correlate in acute illness BD.•The best predictor of subjective cognitive functioning is depressive symptoms.•Mood symptoms moderate the relationship between subjective and objective cognitions.
Patients may present cognitive deficits during all stages of bipolar disorder (BD). Few studies have examined self-reported cognitive difficulties and its relation to neurocognitive dysfunction during symptomatic periods of BD. This study aimed to compare subjective cognitive functioning and explore associations between subjective and objective cognitive functioning across different BD clinical states, and investigate the predicting and moderating roles of mood symptoms.
Subjective cognitive functioning (measured by Cognitive Complaints in Bipolar Disorder Rating Assessment, COBRA) and several domains of cognitive functioning (assessed by a neuropsychological battery), including executive functions, attention and processing speed, and visual memory, were examined in 48 hypomanic or manic patients, 42 depressed bipolar patients, 50 euthymic bipolar patients and 60 healthy comparisons.
All patients exhibited subjective and objective cognitive deficits in relation to healthy comparisons. There was a significant association between subjective and objective cognitive functioning in euthymic group, but the association was not significant in acute symptomatic groups, which could be moderated by depressive or manic symptoms in depressive or manic group, respectively. Subjective cognitive functioning was significantly correlated with mood symptoms, and the best predictor of subjective cognitive functioning was depressive symptoms.
This was a cross-sectional study with a mixed sample of inpatients and outpatients. The medication effect was not adjusted.
The associations between subjective and objective cognitive dysfunction varied in clinical states, and mood symptoms moderated the associations. A neuropsychological test battery is required to substantiate actual cognitive dysfunction in clinical settings, irrespective of subjective cognitive deficits.
Although across-test intra-individual variability (IIV), or dispersion, has been shown to be a valuable marker of neurological health in a variety of clinical samples, IIV has not been well examined ...in the context of mild traumatic brain injury (mTBI). In the present study, we examined measures of IIV in military Veterans with and without a history of mTBI. Secondly, we examined how measures of IIV relate to traditional indices of mean cognitive performance, TBI characteristics, and neuropsychiatric symptoms in mTBI. Participants included 120 Veterans (67 mTBI, 53 military controls MCs) who completed a comprehensive neuropsychological assessment. Two dispersion indices were calculated using 13 norm-referenced variables: an average standard deviation (ASD) score and a maximum discrepancy (MD) score. Compared to MCs, Veterans with a history of mTBI demonstrated greater IIV as indicated by the MD index after adjusting for relevant demographic variables, PTSD symptoms, and mean-level cognitive performance (p = 0.027; ηp2 = 0.043), and there was a trend finding in the same direction for the ASD index (p = 0.091; ηp2 = 0.025). Among the mTBI participants, the two IIV indices were positively correlated with each other (p < 0.001, r = 0.921) and negatively correlated with mean cognitive performance (p = 0.017–0.022, r = −0.279–0.291). In contrast, ASD and MD scores were not associated with a measure of premorbid intellectual functioning or neuropsychiatric symptoms (all p's > 0.05). However, higher ASD scores were positively related to lifetime number of mTBIs, such that greater cognitive variability was observed in Veterans with a history of multiple mTBIs (i.e., ≥3 mTBIs; p = 0.037, r = 0.255). Overall, our results demonstrate that Veterans with mTBI show greater IIV relative to MCs, and that repetitive mTBI is associated with increased cognitive performance variability. Findings indicate that, in the context of mTBI—which is considerably heterogeneous in nature—measures of dispersion may be more appropriate indicators of cognitive dysfunction when compared to traditional mean neuropsychological scores, especially in those with remote mTBI histories. Future longitudinal studies are needed to further establish the long-term clinical implications and brain-based correlates of these findings.
•mTBI Veterans showed greater IIV (dispersion) than Veterans with no mTBI history.•Repetitive mTBI (≥ 3) was associated with increased cognitive dispersion.•Dispersion was not associated with neuropsychiatric symptoms or premorbid IQ in the mTBI sample.
Grit has been presented as a higher order personality trait that is highly predictive of both success and performance and distinct from other traits such as conscientiousness. This paper provides a ...meta-analytic review of the grit literature with a particular focus on the structure of grit and the relation between grit and performance, retention, conscientiousness, cognitive ability, and demographic variables. Our results based on 584 effect sizes from 88 independent samples representing 66,807 individuals indicate that the higher order structure of grit is not confirmed, that grit is only moderately correlated with performance and retention, and that grit is very strongly correlated with conscientiousness. We also find that the perseverance of effort facet has significantly stronger criterion validities than the consistency of interest facet and that perseverance of effort explains variance in academic performance even after controlling for conscientiousness. In aggregate our results suggest that interventions designed to enhance grit may only have weak effects on performance and success, that the construct validity of grit is in question, and that the primary utility of the grit construct may lie in the perseverance facet.
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Adolescent bariatric surgery produces substantial weight loss and reduction of medical co-morbidities. Research in adult samples shows improved cognitive function postoperatively, although much less ...is known about the potential cognitive benefits of bariatric surgery in adolescents—especially at extended follow-up.
Examine cognitive function 10 years after adolescent bariatric surgery.
University hospital.
A total of 99 young adults who underwent bariatric surgery as adolescents completed a computerized cognitive test battery as part of a larger 10-year postoperative assessment. All had been long-term participants in the Teen-Longitudinal Assessment of Bariatric Surgery (Teen-LABS) study.
Cognitive dysfunction was prevalent on tests of attention and executive function (e.g., Continuous Performance Test – Reaction Time 30%; Maze Errors – Overrun 30%), and 53.5% met research criteria for mild cognitive impairment (MCI). Modified Poisson regression with robust error variance revealed participants with preoperative hypertension and those completing Roux-en-Y gastric bypass were more likely to meet criteria for MCI at 10-year follow-up.
The current findings indicate that cognitive deficits are common 10 years after bariatric surgery. Additional studies are needed to clarify possible cohort effects, determine whether these cognitive deficits persist to even later follow-up (e.g., 20 yr after surgery), and identify underlying mechanisms and mitigation strategies.
•53.5% of young adults that completed bariatric surgery ten years prior as adolescents met criteria for mild cognitive impairment (MCI).•Persons with pre-operative hypertension and those undergoing Roux-en-Y gastric bypass (RYGB) were more likely to exhibit cognitive dysfunction.•Prospective studies are needed to better understand mechanisms for obesity-related cognitive impairment, including biological contributors and possible cohort effects.
Statistical learning (SL) is involved in a wide range of basic and higher-order cognitive functions and is taken to be an important building block of virtually all current theories of information ...processing. In the last 2 decades, a large and continuously growing research community has therefore focused on the ability to extract embedded patterns of regularity in time and space. This work has mostly focused on transitional probabilities, in vision, audition, by newborns, children, adults, in normal developing and clinical populations. Here we appraise this research approach and we critically assess what it has achieved, what it has not, and why it is so. We then center on present SL research to examine whether it has adopted novel perspectives. These discussions lead us to outline possible blueprints for a novel research agenda.
Public Significance Statement
This review targets a fundamental theoretical construct in cognitive science, the learning of regularities in the environment. A critical analysis of past and present achievements of this field of research reveals possible novel experimental directions and theoretical perspectives.
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Existing literature suggests that age affects recognition of affective facial expressions. Eye-tracking studies highlighted that age-related differences in recognition of emotions could be explained ...by different face exploration patterns due to attentional impairment. Gender also seems to play a role in recognition of emotions. Unfortunately, little is known about the differences in emotion perception abilities across lifespans for men and women, even if females show more ability from infancy.
The present study aimed to examine the role of age and gender on facial emotion recognition in relation to neuropsychological functions and face exploration strategies. We also aimed to explore the associations between emotion recognition and quality of life.
60 healthy people were consecutively enrolled in the study and divided into two groups: Younger Adults and Older Adults. Participants were assessed for: emotion recognition, attention abilities, frontal functioning, memory functioning and quality of life satisfaction. During the execution of the emotion recognition test using the Pictures of Facial Affects (PoFA) and a modified version of PoFA (M-PoFA), subject's eye movements were recorded with an Eye Tracker.
Significant differences between younger and older adults were detected for fear recognition when adjusted for cognitive functioning and eye-gaze fixations characteristics. Adjusted means of fear recognition were significantly higher in the younger group than in the older group. With regard to gender's effects, old females recognized identical pairs of emotions better than old males. Considering the Satisfaction Profile (SAT-P) we detected negative correlations between some dimensions (Physical functioning, Sleep/feeding/free time) and emotion recognition (i.e., sadness, and disgust).
The current study provided novel insights into the specific mechanisms that may explain differences in emotion recognition, examining how age and gender differences can be outlined by cognitive functioning and face exploration strategies.
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