Acute cortisol levels and memory performance in older people with high and normal body mass index

  1. Matias M. Pulopulos 1
  2. Sara Puig-Perez 2
  3. Vanesa Hidalgo 3
  4. Teresa Montoliu 4
  5. Alicia Salvador 4
  1. 1 Ghent University
    info

    Ghent University

    Gante, Bélgica

    ROR https://ror.org/00cv9y106

  2. 2 Universidad Internacional de Valencia
    info

    Universidad Internacional de Valencia

    Valencia, España

    ROR https://ror.org/00gjj5n39

  3. 3 Universidad de Zaragoza
    info

    Universidad de Zaragoza

    Zaragoza, España

    ROR https://ror.org/012a91z28

  4. 4 Universitat de València
    info

    Universitat de València

    Valencia, España

    ROR https://ror.org/043nxc105

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Revista:
The Spanish Journal of Psychology

ISSN: 1138-7416

Año de publicación: 2019

Número: 22

Páginas: 44

Tipo: Artículo

DOI: 10.1017/SJP.2019.44 DIALNET GOOGLE SCHOLAR lock_openAcceso abierto editor

Otras publicaciones en: The Spanish Journal of Psychology

Resumen

Previous studies have shown that healthy older adults may be less sensitive to the effects of acute cortisol levels on memory performance than young adults. Importantly, being overweight has recently been associated with an increase in both cortisol concentration and cortisol receptors in central tissues, suggesting that Body Mass Index (BMI) may contribute to differences in the relationship between memory and acute cortisol. This study investigates the role of BMI in the relationship between memory performance and acute cortisol levels in older people (M = 64.70 years; SD = 4.24). We measured cortisol levels and memory performance (working memory and declarative memory) in 33 participants with normal BMI (normal BMI = 18.50–24.99) and 36 participants with overweight BMI (overweight BMI = 25–29.99). Overweight BMI participants showed worse performance on word-list learning (p = .036, 95% CI [0.08, 2.18], η2p = 0.07). Higher cortisol levels were related to higher proactive interference (β = .364, p = .016, 95% CI [0.07, 0.66]), and BMI did not moderate any of the relationships investigated. In accordance with previous studies, our results show worse memory performance in individuals with overweight BMI. However, our results do not support the idea that memory performance in older people with higher BMI may be more sensitive to differences in acute cortisol levels than in older people with normal BMI. More research is needed to test this hypothesis with obese individuals (BMI > 30 Kg/cm2).

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