Level of and Change in Cognitive Functioning among Dutch Older Adults: Does Neighborhood Socioeconomic Status Matter?

Along with demographic changes, issues of age-related cognitive decline and impaired cognitive functioning have become more prevalent. In attempts to identify predictors of cognitive functioning (i.e. the abilities to attend, think, reason and to recall information) in older adults, researchers have looked into features of the residential neighborhood of older adults, especially neighborhood socioeconomic status. Yet, previous findings have been inconclusive due to cross-sectional designs of the majority of studies. Since a true contextual neighborhood effect requires differences in the strength of cognitive dec…