Effect of Social Isolation Depression on Cognitive Decline

Effect of Social Isolation Depression on Cognitive Decline There is a lot of literature investigating how lifestyle factors are associated with protecting cognitive decline in old age. The influence of lifestyle factors on cognitive ageing is of much interest as it is within an individual’s power to change their lifestyle given the knowledge of how it affects their cognition. By identifying what lifestyle factors are related to poorer cognitive function in older adults, individuals can take the necessary interventions to steer themselves on to the right path towards maintaining cognition throughout their lifespan and therefore ensure a better well-being and quality of life. Social factors include many aspects, such as social activities, social networks, social support, living situation and marital status (Hertzog et al., 2009). However this essay focuses on social isolation and loneliness. Depression is commonly included in studies with social isolation and loneliness and therefore is also considered. There is empirical evidence to su ggest that both social isolation/loneliness and depression are related to level of cognition in old age, and this association will be discussed. How social relationships are conceptualised is important as individuals may have a large social network and an active social lifestyle, but few close friends who they feel they can rely on. Considering there are many different ways of conceptualising social lifestyle, researchers need to ensure that their measurement does assess the factor it is supposed to. This is also true for measuring cognitive ability. Including specific domains instead of, or as well as, one general cognitive assessment is favoured in the literature as it allows researchers to examine whether the predictor variables have an influence on cognitive functioning as a whole, or if it only affects certain domains of cognition. DiNapoli et al. (2014) measured global cognition and four specific domains by assessing performance on 6 tasks. However, they warn readers to be cautious of the findings within the domains as some were based on one task and others were based on two, so there is a lack of consistency within the cognitive measurement. This study investigated the effect of social isolation on cognitive function in older adults. The researchers suggest that social isolation is combined of two dimensions: social disconnectedness and perceived isolation and so these were included in the study as secondary predictors. The Lubben Social Network scale-6 (LSNS-6) was used to measure the three social predictors. Social disconnectedness was measured by 2 items from the scale; perceived isolation was measured using 4, and social isolation was the score of all 6. They were all found to have significant effects on global cognitive performance and on the four domains. Perceived isolation was found to affect cognition almost twice as much as social disconnectedness did. This suggests that while having more social relationships is important for maintaining cognition, how we personally feel about our relationships is more important. However, Cronbach’s alpha was considered when determining internal consistency of the LSNS-6 and social disconnectedness was not suggested to be a reliable measurement. This may be because Cronbach’s alpha is affected by the number of items included and social disconnectedness was only measured by 2 items. Because of this, the researchers warn readers to treat the association of social disconnectedness and cognition with caution, although it is unlikely that the result was hugely affected by this as it is consistent with previous findings. This study is a good example of how social factors can be conceptualised in different ways. Social isolation is considered in this study as a combination of social disconnectedness and perceived isolation, whereas others consider social isolation and disconnectedness to be the same thing, and perceived isolation to be something separate. Cornwell Waite (2009) refer to social isolation/disconnectedness as a lack of interaction with others, infrequent participation in social activities and a small social network. Loneliness, on the other hand, refers to perceived isolation and perceived disconnectedness from others, meaning it is about the dissatisfaction with social relationships, intimacy or support, rather than the physical absence of them. It could therefore be argued that there was not a need to measure social isolation as a combination of disconnectedness and perceived isolation, and instead these two factors should have been measured more extensively as separate entities. Depression was included as a covariate. Although it significantly correlated with poorer cognitive performance it was not found to be significant in any of the main regression analyses and therefore was only briefly mentioned. The study included a very specific sample of Appalachian community-dwelling elders, presumably because of the â€Å"isolated† stereotype associated with Appalachia (Hsiung, 2015), although the study does not discuss this. The results therefore may not represent the overall elderly population. As well as ensuring adults were aged 70 or above and from West Virginia, they also had to have at least four natural teeth in order to participate but it is not explained why. Wilson et al. (2007) focused on the effect of loneliness on cognition in old age. As it was a longitudinal study, some participants were lost but a total of 823 older adults were included in the final analysis. Cognitive ability was measured at baseline and at each follow-up. However, there was a discrepancy in the study as some participants were followed-up five times and others only twice, meaning that those who were assessed more may have performed better due to having more familiarity with the tests. Loneliness was measured using a modified version of the de Jong-Gierveld Loneliness scale. The original scale was made up of two components: emotional loneliness and social loneliness. Emotional loneliness is considered the lack of a close intimate relationship such as a partner or a best friend and social loneliness is considered as the lack of a social network or group of friends (De Jong Gierveld Tillburg, 2006). However this study only measured emotional loneliness. Two other minor changes were made but it was still found to be a valid and reliable measurement. Social isolation was also measured using standard questions assessing network size and frequency of social activity. Loneliness was related to cognitive ability at baseline on each cognitive measure, and also to more decline over time in global cognition and in three of the five domains. The longitudinal design allowed researchers to not only observe the effect of loneliness at one point in time but also examine the inter action between loneliness and time and how they affect cognition together. Participants were all free of dementia at the beginning of the study but over the four years 76 participants developed signs of dementia that met the criteria for Alzheimer Disease (AD). It was found that lonely individuals were 2.1 times more likely to develop AD than those who were not lonely. Social network was not related to incidence of AD but perceived loneliness was which suggests that the quality of relationships is more important than the quantity for developing AD. Depressive symptoms were also assessed with a 10-item version of the Centre for Epidemiological Studies – Depression (CES-D) scale. 1 item asked about loneliness and was analysed separately from the remaining 9. This 1 question about loneliness showed a stronger relationship with development of AD than depression did when it was measured using the remaining 9 items. This suggests that loneliness affects cognition more than depression does. When loneliness was analysed with the risk of developing AD, but de pression was controlled for, there was a modest reduction in the association showing that loneliness is partly determined by depressive symptoms. However, when depression and AD were analysed controlling for loneliness, there was a much larger reduction of association, suggesting that loneliness may be an important aspect of the relation between AD and depression. The researchers explored the possibility of reverse causation, which means that loneliness is a consequence of cognition decline instead of it being a cause or contributing factor. They were able to do this as they carried out a post-mortem examination of the brain in the participants who passed away in order to quantify AD pathology and cerebral infarctions. These were not found to have an association with loneliness and therefore do not support the possibility of reverse causation. However this is a very complicated subject and more research is needed. The more likely explanation suggested is that loneliness has a negative effect on the neural systems underlying cognition which is why lonelier individuals experienced more cognitive decline. Luanaigh et al. (2011) also investigated the effect of loneliness, specifically on different domains, in elders free of dementia. A doctor and a researcher visited the participants’ homes to assess them. This could be viewed as a strength of the study as it meant participants would feel more comfortable in their own homes, especially since they have willingly agreed to this, compared to having to travel to an unfamiliar environment, which could also cause fatigue. The Mini Mental State Examination was included as a way of measuring global cognition which is a very brief cognitive test. A detailed psychometric test, much like those used to measure the several domains, would have been better. The measurement of loneliness contained only one question: â€Å"do you feel lonely?† Although there were four possible answers to this question, it could be argued that one item is not enough for adequate measurement. On the other hand, it could also be argued that asking the direct question if an individual feels lonely is an accurate and sufficient measure of loneliness. Those who answered ‘sometimes’ and ‘often’ were grouped together in the ‘lonely’ group, and those who answered ‘rarely’ and ‘never’ were grouped in the ‘not lonely’ group. This meant that the severity of loneliness was not considered. Overall, loneliness was found to be significantly associated with global cognition even when depression and social networks were controlled for. The two domains most strongly associated with loneliness were processing speed, which is consistent within the research, and delayed visual memory, which is a new finding and therefore requires more research. Just like the problems of conceptualising social isolation, there are also problems with conceptualising depression. There are many severities of depression, which Dillon et al. (2014) explores. 118 depressed older adults and 40 healthy controls were matched on age and education. One problem with this is that for every 12 depressed participants there are only 5 controls. There were four subtypes of depression: Major Depression Disorder; Dysthymia Disorder; Subsyndromal Depression Disorder; and Depression due to (mild Alzheimer) dementia. Those who had moderate-severe dementia were excluded from the study. Global cognitive performance was worse for the depressed group than the controls suggesting that depression is associated with poorer cognitive functioning in old age. All four sub-types showed impairments with memory, however this could be due to the fact that they were recruited from a memory clinic, meaning it is a biased sample as they all had memory complaints. Aside from memory, the subtypes all showed impairments with different domains. This illustrates the importance of measuring both global cognitive function and specific domains, and also of looking at different subtypes of depression instead of only depressive symptoms. Overall, the research shows that depression and social isolation/loneliness in old age are related to poorer cognitive functioning. It is suggested that how individuals perceive their social relationships is more important than number of relationships when it comes to cognition. Therefore interventions should focus on perceived support and loneliness. As the studies are of observational design, the direction of the relationship is unclear. It is not possible to say that depression or loneliness cause cognitive decline as they could in fact be consequences of the decline. The relationship between depression and loneliness is also complicated as one could influence the other. As mentioned in one study, a depression scale asked about loneliness and therefore researchers need to ensure their measurements are valid. Longitudinal studies are able to look at level of decline over time but cross-sectional studies are not, and therefore more longitudinal research would be useful to understand how the period and severity of depression and loneliness affect how cognition changes with time. Word count Title = 10 Essay = 2000 References Cornwell, E. Y. Waite, L. J. (2009). Social Disconnectedness, Perceived Isolation, and Health among Older Adults. Journal of Health and Social Behaviour, 50(1), 31-48. doi: 10.1177/002214650905000103 De Jong Gierveld, J. Van Tillburg, T. (2006). A 6-Item Scale for Overall, Emotional, and Social Loneliness: Confirmatory Tests of Survey Data. Research of Aging, 28(5), 582-598. doi: 10.1177/0164027506289723 Dillon, C., Tartaglini, M. F., Stefani, D., Salgado, D., Taragano, F. E., Allegit, R. F. (2014). Geriatric depression and its relation with cognitive impairment and dementia. Archives of Gerontology and Geriatrics, 59(2), 450-456. doi: 10.1016/j.archger.2014.04.006 DiNapoli, E. A., Wu, B., Scogin, F. (2014). Social Isolation and Cognitive Function in Appalachian Older Adults. Research on Aging, 36(2), 161-179. doi: 10.1177/0164027512470704 Hertzog, C., Kramer, A. F., Wilson, R. S., Lindenberger, U. (2009). Enrichment Effects on Adult Cognitive Development. Can the Functional Capacity of Older Adults Be Preserved and Enhanced? A Journal of the Association for Psychological Science, 9(1), 1-65. Hsiung, D. C. (2015). Two Worlds in the Tennessee Mountains: Exploring the Origins of Appalachian Stereotypes. Kentucky: The University Press of Kentucky. Luanaigh, C. O., Connell, H. O., Chin, A. V., Hamilton, F., Coen, R., Walsh, C., Walsh, J. B., Caokley, D., Cunningham, C., Lawlor, B. A. (2011). Loneliness and cognition in older people: The Dublin Healthy Ageing study. Aging and Mental Health, 16(3), 347-352. doi: 10.1080/13607863.2011.628977 Wilson, R. S., Krueger, K. R., Arnold, S. E., Schneider, J. A., Kelly, J. F., Barnes, L. L., Tang, Y., Bennett, D. A. (2007). Loneliness and Risk of Alzheimer Disease. Archives of General Psychiatry, 64(2), 234-240. doi: 10.1001/archpsyc.64.2.234 1

Fast Food in Malaysia Essay

Restaurants have been around in some form for most of human civilization. But they usually catered to travelers. As far back as ancient Greece and Rome, inns and taverns generally served food to people who had a reason to be away from home. This trend continued until relatively recently. Although taverns and coffee houses were popular places to gather and share beverages in the 17th century, the idea of eating out for fun didn’t take off in Western society until the late 18th century. Although McDonald’s was the first restaurant to use the assembly-line system, some people think of White Castle as the first fast-food chain. White Castle was founded in 1921 in Wichita, Kansas. At the time, most people considered the burgers sold at fairs, circuses, lunch counters and carts to be low-quality. Many people thought hamburger came from slaughterhouse scraps and spoiled meat. White Castle’s founders decided to change the public’s perception of hamburgers. They built their restaurants so that customers could see the food being prepared. They painted the buildings white and even chose a name that suggested cleanliness. White Castle was most popular in the American East and Midwest, but its success helped give hamburger meat a better reputation nationwide. So, like cars, White Castle played an important part in the development of fast food. Image courtesy Brands of the World The McDonald brothers opened their redesigned restaurant in 1948, and several fast-food chains that exist today opened soon after. Burger King and Taco Bell got their start in the 1950s, and Wendy’s opened in 1969. Some chains, like Carl’s Jr. , KFC and Jack in the Box, existed before the Speedee Service System, but modified their cooking techniques after its debut. McDonald’s, which started it all, is now the world’s largest fast-food chain. According to the National Restaurant Association, American sales of fast food totaled $163. 5 billion in 2005 [ref]. The industry is growing globally as well. Total sales for McDonald’s grew 5. percent in 2005, and the company now has 30,000 franchised stores in more than 120 countries [ref and ref]. However, McDonald’s – and fast food in general – does not always get a welcoming reception around the world. McDonald’s restaurants have been attacked in several countries, including the United States, China, Belgium, Holland, India, Russia, Sweden and the U. K. Protestors have accused McDonald’s and other chains of selling unhealthy food, marketing aggressively to children and undermining local values and culture.

Essay about Gender differences and autobiographical memories

Autobiographical memory is essentially a system that contains episodic memories from individuals’ lives, autobiographical memory is what makes each and every one of us different to another, and essentially what forms the self, connecting us to others, history and the future. â€Å"Autobiographical memories from the mundane to the profound, help form the self, they provide personal historical context or personal biography for who we are now: they are in essence a ‘database’ of the self.†(Conway, A and Holmes, E, 2005, p228) There has been research conducted into gender differences within autobiographical memories and although not fully understood it has become an apparent theme, that female participants provide more detailed, richer†¦show more content†¦This like many other studies supports the idea that vivid memories are related to a higher level of emotion or arousal within the participant and therefore more easily accessible, by showing a picture rather than a verbal cue participants display a higher level of connection to the cue. Research conducted by Popovski, M and Bates, G.W (2005) again concerned with the links between gender differences and recall within autobiographical memory, the difference within this study is that participants were scaled on the Depression and anxiety scale from a questionnaire completed and then categorised into dysphoric or non-dysphoric groups to see if more detailed or general responses were provided to a set of positive, neutral and negative cue words. Research here was being conducted to see if particular genders, genetics or childhood experiences are more susceptible to depression. Hypothesis here being tested was to see if patients with depressive and dysphoric symptoms had issues accessing autobiographical memories and whether it would be possible to determine between the two groups. It was suggested that patients who scored high on the scale for depressive symptoms would provide more general descriptions from autobiographical memory when relating to feelings. 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Definition and Examples of Anastrophe in Rhetoric

Anastrophe is a  rhetorical term for the inversion of conventional word order. Adjective: anastrophic. Related to transferred epithet and also known as  hyperbaton, transcensio, transgressio, and tresspasser, the term derives from Greek and meaning turning upside down. Anastrophe is most commonly used to emphasize one or more of the words that have been reversed. Richard Lanham notes that Quintilian would confine anastrophe to a transposition of two words only, a pattern Puttenham mocks with In my years lusty, many a deed doughty did I (A Handlist of Rhetorical Terms, 1991). Examples and Observations of  Anastrophe Ready are you? What know you of ready? For eight hundred years have I trained Jedi. My own counsel will I keep on who is to be trained. . . . This one a long time have I watched. . . . Never his mind on where he was. (Yoda in Star Wars: Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back, 1980)Sure I am of this, that you have only to endure to conquer. (Winston Churchill, address delivered at the Guildhall, London, September 14, 1914)Gracious she was. By gracious I mean full of graces. . . .Intelligent she was not. In fact, she veered in the opposite direction.(Max Shulman, The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis. Doubleday, 1951)Clear, placid Leman! thy contrasted lakeWith the wild world I dwelt in.(Lord Byron, Childe Harold)From the Land of Sky Blue Waters,From the land of pines lofty balsams,Comes the beer refreshing,Hamms the beer refreshing.(Jingle for Hamms Beer, with lyrics by Nelle Richmond Eberhart)Talent, Mr. Micawber has; capital, Mr. Micawber has not. (Charles Dickens, David Copperfield, 1848)Cori e Bratter: Six days does not a week make.Paul Bratter: What does that mean?Corie Bratter: I dont know!(Jane Fonda and Robert Redford in Barefoot in the Park, 1967) Timestyle and New Yorker Style A ghastly ghoul prowled around a cemetery not far from Paris. Into family chapels went he, robbery of the dead intent upon. (Foreign News Notes, Time magazine, June 2, 1924)Backward ran sentences until reels the mind. . . . Where it all will end, knows God! (Wolcott Gibbs, from a parody of Time magazine. The New Yorker, 1936)Today almost forgotten is Timestyle, overheated method of newswriting by which, in Roaring Twenties, Turbulent Thirties, Time sought to put mark on language of Shakespeare, Milton. Featured in adjective-studded Timestyle were inverted syntax (verbs first, nouns later), capitalized compound epithets (Cinemactor Clark Gable, Radiorator H. V. Kaltenborn), astounding neologisms (rescued from Asiatic obscurity were Tycoon, Pundit Mogul, oft-used still by newshawks, newshens), sometime omission of definite, indefinite articles, ditto final ands in series except when replaced by ampersands. Utterly unlike Timestyle was New Yorker style. Relied latter heavily then, reli es it still on grammatical fanaticism, abhorrence of indirection, insistence on comma before final and in series. Short, snappy were Time’s paragraphs. Long, languid were The New Yorker’s. (Hendrik Hertzberg, Luce vs. Ross. The New Yorker, Feb. 21, 2000) Emphatic Word Order Anastrophe often is used to add emphasis. Consider a comic example. In a Dilbert cartoon strip published on March 5, 1998, the pointy-haired boss announces that he will begin using the chaos theory of management. Dilberts co-worker Wally replies, And this will be different how? Normally, we would place the interrogative  adverb how at the beginning of the sentence (as in How would this be different?). By deviating from the normal word order, Wally places extra emphasis on the question of difference. Wallys extra emphasis suggests that the new theory will not dramatically change the bosss behavior. (James Jasinski, Sourcebook of Rhetoric. Sage, 2001) Anastrophe in Films Anastrophe is an unusual arrangement, an inversion of what is logical or normal, in literature of the words of a sentence, in film of the image, in angle, in focus, and in lighting. It comprises all forms of technical distortion. It is clearly a figure to be used rarely, and it is not always certain if it has the effect intended. . . .[I]n the Ballad of a Soldier (Grigori Chukhrai), one of two signalmen is killed, and the other runs, pursued by a German tank. In a down air shot, the camera pans with tank and man, and at one point the scene turns, placing the ground up, the sky bottom right, the chase continuing. Is it the disoriented panic of the man fleeing wildly without plan, or the manic mind of the tank driver, pursuing one man, when he should be addressing himself to the destruction of companies, when, in fact, he could shoot? A bizarre act seems to call for an anastrophic treatment. (N. Roy Clifton, The Figure in Film. Associated University Presses, 1983)