Late-life cynical distrust, risk of incident dementia, and mortality in a population-based cohort
Citation Manager Formats
Make Comment
See Comments

This article requires a subscription to view the full text. If you have a subscription you may use the login form below to view the article. Access to this article can also be purchased.
Abstract
Objective: We investigated the association between late-life cynical distrust and incident dementia and mortality (mean follow-up times of 8.4 and 10.4 years, respectively) in the Cardiovascular Risk Factors, Aging and Dementia Study.
Methods: Cynical distrust was measured based on the Cook-Medley Scale and categorized into tertiles. Cognitive status was evaluated with a 3-step protocol including screening, clinical phase, and differential diagnostic phase. Dementia was diagnosed according to DSM-IV criteria. Complete data on exposure, outcome, and confounders were available from 622 persons (46 dementia cases) for the dementia analyses and from 1,146 persons (361 deaths) for the mortality analyses. Age, sex, systolic blood pressure, total cholesterol, fasting glucose, body mass index, socioeconomic background, smoking, alcohol use, self-reported health, and APOE genotype were considered as confounders.
Results: Cynical distrust was not associated with dementia in the crude analyses, but those with the highest level of cynical distrust had higher risk of dementia after adjusting for confounders (relative risk 3.13; 95% confidence interval [CI] 1.15–8.55). Higher cynical distrust was associated with higher mortality in the crude analyses (hazard ratio 1.40; 95% CI 1.05–1.87) but the association was explained by confounders (adjusted hazard ratio 1.19; 95% CI 0.86–1.61).
Conclusions: Higher cynical distrust in late life was associated with higher mortality, but this association was explained by socioeconomic position, lifestyle, and health status. Association between cynical distrust and incident dementia became evident when confounders were considered. This novel finding suggests that both psychosocial and lifestyle-related risk factors may be modifiable targets for interventions. We acknowledge the need for larger replication studies.
GLOSSARY
- AD=
- Alzheimer disease;
- BMI=
- body mass index;
- CAIDE=
- Cardiovascular Risk Factors, Aging and Dementia;
- CI=
- confidence interval;
- DSM-IV=
- Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 4th edition;
- MMSE=
- Mini-Mental State Examination
Footnotes
Go to Neurology.org for full disclosures. Funding information and disclosures deemed relevant by the authors, if any, are provided at the end of the article.
Supplemental data at Neurology.org
- Received December 4, 2013.
- Accepted in final form March 13, 2014.
- © 2014 American Academy of Neurology
AAN Members
We have changed the login procedure to improve access between AAN.com and the Neurology journals. If you are experiencing issues, please log out of AAN.com and clear history and cookies. (For instructions by browser, please click the instruction pages below). After clearing, choose preferred Journal and select login for AAN Members. You will be redirected to a login page where you can log in with your AAN ID number and password. When you are returned to the Journal, your name should appear at the top right of the page.
AAN Non-Member Subscribers
Purchase access
For assistance, please contact:
AAN Members (800) 879-1960 or (612) 928-6000 (International)
Non-AAN Member subscribers (800) 638-3030 or (301) 223-2300 option 3, select 1 (international)
Sign Up
Information on how to subscribe to Neurology and Neurology: Clinical Practice can be found here
Purchase
Individual access to articles is available through the Add to Cart option on the article page. Access for 1 day (from the computer you are currently using) is US$ 39.00. Pay-per-view content is for the use of the payee only, and content may not be further distributed by print or electronic means. The payee may view, download, and/or print the article for his/her personal, scholarly, research, and educational use. Distributing copies (electronic or otherwise) of the article is not allowed.
Letters: Rapid online correspondence
- Unemployment, cynical distrust and dementia
- Jose G. Castano, Full-professor, Departamento Bioquimica UAMjoseg.castano@uam.es
- Jose G. Castano, Madrid, Spain
Submitted June 27, 2014
REQUIREMENTS
You must ensure that your Disclosures have been updated within the previous six months. Please go to our Submission Site to add or update your Disclosure information.
Your co-authors must send a completed Publishing Agreement Form to Neurology Staff (not necessary for the lead/corresponding author as the form below will suffice) before you upload your comment.
If you are responding to a comment that was written about an article you originally authored:
You (and co-authors) do not need to fill out forms or check disclosures as author forms are still valid
and apply to letter.
Submission specifications:
- Submissions must be < 200 words with < 5 references. Reference 1 must be the article on which you are commenting.
- Submissions should not have more than 5 authors. (Exception: original author replies can include all original authors of the article)
- Submit only on articles published within 6 months of issue date.
- Do not be redundant. Read any comments already posted on the article prior to submission.
- Submitted comments are subject to editing and editor review prior to posting.
You May Also be Interested in
Dr. Nicole Sur and Dr. Mausaminben Hathidara
► Watch
Topics Discussed
Alert Me
Recommended articles
-
Articles
Serum cholesterol changes after midlife and late-life cognitionTwenty-one-year follow-up studyA. Solomon, I. Kåreholt, T. Ngandu et al.Neurology, March 05, 2007 -
Articles
Education and dementiaWhat lies behind the association?T. Ngandu, E. von Strauss, E. -L. Helkala et al.Neurology, October 01, 2007 -
Articles
Total cholesterol and the risk of Parkinson diseaseG. Hu, R. Antikainen, P. Jousilahti et al.Neurology, April 09, 2008 -
Articles
High total cholesterol levels in late life associated with a reduced risk of dementiaM. M. Mielke, P. P. Zandi, M. Sjögren et al.Neurology, April 20, 2005