Abstract
AbstractDuring ageing, different cognitive functions decline at different rates. Additionally, cognitive reserve may influence inter-individual variability in age-related cognitive decline. These complex relationships can be studied by constructing a so-called cognitive connectome and characterising it with advanced graph-theoretical network analyses. This study examined the effect of cognitive reserve on the cognitive connectome across age. A total of 334 cognitively healthy participants were stratified into early middle age (37–50 years; n = 110), late middle age (51–64 years; n = 106), and elderly (65–78 years; n = 118) groups. Within each age group, individuals were subdivided into high and low cognitive reserve. For each subgroup, a cognitive connectome was constructed based on correlations between 47 cognitive variables. Applying graph theory, different global network measures were compared between the groups. Graph-theoretical network analyses revealed that individuals with high cognitive reserve were characterized by a stable cognitive connectome across age groups. High cognitive reserve groups only differed in modularity. In contrast, individuals with low cognitive reserve showed a marked reconfiguration of cognitive connectomes across age groups with differences extending over a variety of network measures including network strength, global efficiency, modularity, and small-worldness. Our results suggest a stabilizing effect of cognitive reserve on the cognitive connectome. Gaining further insights into these findings and underlying mechanisms will contribute to our understanding of age-related cognitive decline and guide the development of strategies to preserve cognitive function in ageing.
Funder
All funding information provided in manuscript
Karolinska Institute
Publisher
Springer Science and Business Media LLC