Perceived social support is associated with cognitive performance in late-life depression: a preliminary study

Introduction Late-life depression often coincides with deficits in executive functions, which are associated with poor treatment response and persistent functional impairment. Perceived social support is a protective factor against late-life depression severity and recurrence. Among non-depressed healthy older adults, social support has been linked with executive functions. However, data is scarce on the association between social support and cognitive outcomes in late life depression. Methods Depressed older adults (60 – 85 years; n = 54) who met DSM-IV criteria for Major Depressive Disorder (MDD) without psychotic features completed measures of perceived social support and specific executive functions including verbal fluency, cognitive inhibition, set-shifting, and self-reported dysexecutive behavior. We sought to determine whether greater levels of perceived social support are associated with better performance on measures of executive function. We also explored the relationship of perceived social support and global cognition, verbal memory, and processing speed to test the specificity of the associations. Results In our regression model predicting phonemic verbal fluency scores (FAS; F (5,45) = 7.30, p<0.001), we found a significant main effect of Perceived Social Support (b=1.511, p=0.005), after correcting for multiple comparisons. All models adjusted for age, gender, education, and MADRS scores. Stronger perceived social support was associated with better phonemic verbal fluency, but not other indices of executive functioning, global cognitive functioning, processing speed, or verbal memory. Conclusions Findings shed light on a modifiable risk factor, social support, which if emphasized in interventions may improve both mood and persistent cognitive difficulties in late-life depression. Future studies using a longitudinal design and a more nuanced examination of social support will provide further insight into the relationship of social support to mood and cognitive trajectories in late-life depression. This research was funded by This study was supported by the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) grants R01 MH097735 (Gunning), and K23 MH123864 (Solomonov) and T32 MH019132-31 (Alexopoulos). Late-life depression often coincides with deficits in executive functions, which are associated with poor treatment response and persistent functional impairment. Perceived social support is a protective factor against late-life depression severity and recurrence. Among non-depressed healthy older adults, social support has been linked with executive functions. However, data is scarce on the association between social support and cognitive outcomes in late life depression. Depressed older adults (60 – 85 years; n = 54) who met DSM-IV criteria for Major Depressive Disorder (MDD) without psychotic features completed measures of perceived social support and specific executive functions including verbal fluency, cognitive inhibition, set-shifting, and self-reported dysexecutive behavior. We sought to determine whether greater levels of perceived social support are associated with better performance on measures of executive function. We also explored the relationship of perceived social support and global cognition, verbal memory, and processing speed to test the specificity of the associations. In our regression model predicting phonemic verbal fluency scores (FAS; F (5,45) = 7.30, p<0.001), we found a significant main effect of Perceived Social Support (b=1.511, p=0.005), after correcting for multiple comparisons. All models adjusted for age, gender, education, and MADRS scores. Stronger perceived social support was associated with better phonemic verbal fluency, but not other indices of executive functioning, global cognitive functioning, processing speed, or verbal memory. Findings shed light on a modifiable risk factor, social support, which if emphasized in interventions may improve both mood and persistent cognitive difficulties in late-life depression. Future studies using a longitudinal design and a more nuanced examination of social support will provide further insight into the relationship of social support to mood and cognitive trajectories in late-life depression.