Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of contributors
- Preface
- Psychology, health and illness
- Adolescent lifestyle
- Age and physical functioning
- Age and cognitive functioning
- Ageing and health
- Architecture and health
- Attributions and health
- Childhood influences on health
- Children's perceptions of illness and death
- Coping with bereavement
- Coping with chronic illness
- Coping with chronic pain
- Coping with death and dying
- Coping with stressful medical procedures
- Cultural and ethnic factors in health
- Delay in seeking help
- Diet and health
- Disability
- Emotional expression and health
- Expectations and health
- Gender issues and women's health
- The health belief model
- Health-related behaviours: common factors
- Hospitalization in adults
- Hospitalization in children
- Hostility and Type A behaviour in coronary artery disease
- Lay beliefs about health and illness
- Life events and health
- Men's health
- Noise: effects on health
- Pain: a multidimensional perspective
- Perceived control
- Personality and health
- Physical activity and health
- Placebos
- Psychoneuroimmunology
- Psychosomatics
- Quality of life
- Religion and health
- Risk perception and health behaviour
- Self-efficacy in health functioning
- Sexual risk behaviour
- Sleep and health
- Social support and health
- Socioeconomic status and health
- Stigma
- Stress and health
- Symptom perception
- Theory of planned behaviour
- Transtheoretical model of behaviour change
- Unemployment and health
- Brain imaging and function
- Communication assessment
- Coping assessment
- Diagnostic interviews and clinical practice
- Disability assessment
- Health cognition assessment
- Health status assessment
- Illness cognition assessment
- IQ testing
- Assessment of mood
- Neuropsychological assessment
- Neuropsychological assessment of attention and executive functioning
- Neuropsychological assessment of learning and memory
- Pain assessment
- Patient satisfaction assessment
- Psychoneuroimmunology assessments
- Qualitative assessment
- Quality of life assessment
- Social support assessment
- Stress assessment
- Behaviour therapy
- Biofeedback
- Cognitive behaviour therapy
- Community-based interventions
- Counselling
- Group therapy
- Health promotion
- Hypnosis
- Motivational interviewing
- Neuropsychological rehabilitation
- Pain management
- Physical activity interventions
- Psychodynamic psychotherapy
- Psychosocial care of the elderly
- Relaxation training
- Self-management interventions
- Social support interventions
- Stress management
- Worksite interventions
- Adherence to treatment
- Attitudes of health professionals
- Breaking bad news
- Burnout in health professionals
- Communicating risk
- Healthcare professional–patient communication
- Healthcare work environments
- Informed consent
- Interprofessional education in essence
- Medical decision-making
- Medical interviewing
- Patient-centred healthcare
- Patient safety and iatrogenesis
- Patient satisfaction
- Psychological support for healthcare professionals
- Reassurance
- Screening in healthcare: general issues
- Shiftwork and health
- Stress in health professionals
- Surgery
- Teaching communication skills
- Written communication
- Medical topics
- Index
- References
Age and cognitive functioning
from Psychology, health and illness
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 18 December 2014
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of contributors
- Preface
- Psychology, health and illness
- Adolescent lifestyle
- Age and physical functioning
- Age and cognitive functioning
- Ageing and health
- Architecture and health
- Attributions and health
- Childhood influences on health
- Children's perceptions of illness and death
- Coping with bereavement
- Coping with chronic illness
- Coping with chronic pain
- Coping with death and dying
- Coping with stressful medical procedures
- Cultural and ethnic factors in health
- Delay in seeking help
- Diet and health
- Disability
- Emotional expression and health
- Expectations and health
- Gender issues and women's health
- The health belief model
- Health-related behaviours: common factors
- Hospitalization in adults
- Hospitalization in children
- Hostility and Type A behaviour in coronary artery disease
- Lay beliefs about health and illness
- Life events and health
- Men's health
- Noise: effects on health
- Pain: a multidimensional perspective
- Perceived control
- Personality and health
- Physical activity and health
- Placebos
- Psychoneuroimmunology
- Psychosomatics
- Quality of life
- Religion and health
- Risk perception and health behaviour
- Self-efficacy in health functioning
- Sexual risk behaviour
- Sleep and health
- Social support and health
- Socioeconomic status and health
- Stigma
- Stress and health
- Symptom perception
- Theory of planned behaviour
- Transtheoretical model of behaviour change
- Unemployment and health
- Brain imaging and function
- Communication assessment
- Coping assessment
- Diagnostic interviews and clinical practice
- Disability assessment
- Health cognition assessment
- Health status assessment
- Illness cognition assessment
- IQ testing
- Assessment of mood
- Neuropsychological assessment
- Neuropsychological assessment of attention and executive functioning
- Neuropsychological assessment of learning and memory
- Pain assessment
- Patient satisfaction assessment
- Psychoneuroimmunology assessments
- Qualitative assessment
- Quality of life assessment
- Social support assessment
- Stress assessment
- Behaviour therapy
- Biofeedback
- Cognitive behaviour therapy
- Community-based interventions
- Counselling
- Group therapy
- Health promotion
- Hypnosis
- Motivational interviewing
- Neuropsychological rehabilitation
- Pain management
- Physical activity interventions
- Psychodynamic psychotherapy
- Psychosocial care of the elderly
- Relaxation training
- Self-management interventions
- Social support interventions
- Stress management
- Worksite interventions
- Adherence to treatment
- Attitudes of health professionals
- Breaking bad news
- Burnout in health professionals
- Communicating risk
- Healthcare professional–patient communication
- Healthcare work environments
- Informed consent
- Interprofessional education in essence
- Medical decision-making
- Medical interviewing
- Patient-centred healthcare
- Patient safety and iatrogenesis
- Patient satisfaction
- Psychological support for healthcare professionals
- Reassurance
- Screening in healthcare: general issues
- Shiftwork and health
- Stress in health professionals
- Surgery
- Teaching communication skills
- Written communication
- Medical topics
- Index
- References
Summary
Ageing and cognitive functioning: an overview
Attitudes about ageing reflect many negative stereotypes about the intellectual prowess of our senior citizens (Center for the Advancement of Health, 1998). Are older people as cognitively deficient as is commonly assumed? Are they significantly less capable than middle-aged or younger adults of profiting from classroom instruction, solving everyday problems such as remembering to turn off the oven after removing a roast, or learning to operate such new technologies as computers, DVD players, or ATM machines?
Study of the abilities to learn, remember, and solve problems has a long history in psychology and is arguably the most thoroughly investigated aspect of adult development and ageing (Siegelman & Rider, 2003). One reason for this emphasis is that cognitive functioning in adulthood has so many important implications for the quality of ordinary people's lives. Furthermore, cognitive functioning can play a major role in how people feel about themselves as they age. Middle-aged adults occasionally claim that they have experienced a ‘senior moment’ after forgetting someone's name, their own telephone number, or a step in a well practiced procedure such as recording a programme on their VCR. Although such comments may be offered in a humorous light, they also may reflect a deep-seated concern that many middle-aged and older adults have about losing their memories (Whitbourne, 2005) (see ‘Dementias’).
Indeed, older adults have reasons for suspecting that their cognitive powers are declining.
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- Chapter
- Information
- Cambridge Handbook of Psychology, Health and Medicine , pp. 15 - 20Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2007
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