Determinants of real world executive abilities in healthy older adults

Abstract

[eng] BACKGROUND: Executive functions (EFs) are one of the most difficult skills to assess and the currently used tools lack consistency. Moreover, most of them evaluate a range of different skills without examining whether they mirror real world abilities. EFs are commonly impaired in aging, yet little do we know regarding the impact that other variables, such as depression, anxiety, fluid intelligence or even years since retirement may have on their performance. OBJECTIVES: As a first step, we examined what determines real world executive performance in healthy older adults, and whether it is biased by the above-mentioned variables. Furthermore, a relationship between traditional and ecologically valid executive tasks was investigated. METHODS: a neuropsychology battery was administered to 39 healthy older adults. The battery included a fluid intelligence task (Advanced Progressive Matrices), an anxiety and depression questionnaire (Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale) as well as different executive measures, some of them traditional (Victoria Stroop test, letter fluency and Brixton test) and others boasting ecological validity (Multitasking test and Behavioural Assessment of Dysexecutive Syndrome). Lineal stepwise regression analyses and correlations between variables were conducted. RESULTS: No overall correlation was found between the traditional and ecologically valid executive tasks, or between both real-world measures. Retirement years was the only variable predicting Multitasking performance, while anxiety and fluid intelligence were the only predictors of BADS performance. CONCLUSION: Real world executive functioning seems to be determined not only by cognition (fluid intelligence) but also by affective factors (anxiety) and age-related issues (retirement years). However, EFs embrace plenty of structures and functions, therefore a successful executive assessment should entail a range of executive tasks. Those involving different structures and highly related to real world performance should be prioritised.