Exploring Sedentary Behavior and Cognition Across the Aging Spectrum

While cognitive decline is an inevitable part of aging, a lot of research today is centered around slowing the rate and severity of it, particularly to reduce the risk of age-related diseases and improve the quality of life. Much of the recent research regarding cognitive decline has focused on how lifestyle practices can influence cognition, e.g., what impact fitness has on cognitive health. Physical activity has been shown to positively impact cognition, but the role of sedentary behavior is vague. This study assessed adult participants across the aging spectrum (N = 46, ages 18-86) to analyze the relationship between the cognitive data from four neuropsychological tests and the sedentary behavior data from wrist-worn accelerometers to better understand if and how sedentary behavior impacts cognition across the aging spectrum. The results of this study found that the NIH Toolbox® Picture Sequence Memory Task had a significant negative relationship with daily average time spent in sedentary behavior, suggesting that increased time spent in sedentary behavior is associated with poorer performance in episodic memory tasks.National Institute on Aging of the NIH, R01AG068882, awarded to Dr. Scott HayesNational Institute on Aging of the NIH, R21AG056921, awarded to Dr. Scott HayesThe Ohio State University Discovery Themes Chronic Brain Injury Initiative, grant awarded to Dr. Scott HayesNo embargoAcademic Major: Neuroscienc