Elizabeth Zelinski

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Elizabeth Zelinski is an American college professor known for her expertise in gerontechnology, neuroscience, and cognition. She is the Rita and Edward Polusky Chair in Education and Aging Professor of Gerontology and Psychology at the USC Davis School of Gerontology and she heads the Center for Digital Aging. [1] Zelinski studies longitudinal changes in objective cognition and self-reported memory in healthy older adults, interventions to improve their cognition and health effects on cognition in aging.

Contents

Biography

Zelinski also has joint appointments in the Psychology Department, Neurosciences and the Study of Women and Men in Society (SWMS) Programs. She is the principal investigator of the Long Beach Longitudinal Study. [2] This study evaluates cognition, memory and language comprehension in older adults as well as the relationship between peoples' perceptions of their memory ability and their actual performance, and how these change as people grow old. [3]

She graduated summa cum laude from Pace University and received her graduate degrees in psychology, with a specialization in aging, from the University of Southern California. Zelinski was a postdoctoral fellow at Claremont Graduate School. She also served as the Interim Dean of the USC Davis School of Gerontology. [4]

Career

Zelinski developed the first comprehensive standardized questionnaire of self-reported memory to determine whether people's beliefs about their memory are echoed in their objective performance. The questionnaire, the Memory Functioning Questionnaire (MFQ), has modest concurrent validity with respect to memory performance and is a better predictor of performance than responses to a yes/no question about memory problems, as commonly used in medical history-taking. Correlates of memory ratings include age, memory performance, depression, health ratings, education, and personality, and these findings translate across my comprehensive longitudinal study of aging (the Long Beach Longitudinal Study) and a nationally representative sample of older adults. Changes in ratings up to 19 years after baseline measurement are modestly associated with increasing age as well as declining objective performance. The MFQ has been used in samples of older adults throughout the United States and other countries. Questionnaires similar to it are in wide use today.

About 25% of the American population over the age of 70 rate their memory abilities as fair or poor. Many older adults are concerned about developing dementia, and recent findings of brain plasticity throughout life have created much interest in brain training to improve cognition. Zelinski's current work shows that cognitive interventions involving repeated practice of simple cognitive skills are effective for improving cognitive abilities of healthy elderly. This is important for alleviating older peoples’ concerns about declines, but may help them to remain independent longer, a major goal of reducing the economic and psychological costs of care for an aging population. She has given many interviews on the subject of cognitive training and gerontechnology, including the popular video game Brain Age. [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11]

Honors

Publications

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Geriatrics</span> Specialty that focuses on health care of elderly people

Geriatrics, or geriatric medicine, is a medical specialty focused on providing care for the unique health needs of older adults. The term geriatrics originates from the Greek γέρων geron meaning "old man", and ιατρός iatros meaning "healer". It aims to promote health by preventing, diagnosing and treating disease in older adults. There is no defined age at which patients may be under the care of a geriatrician, or geriatric physician, a physician who specializes in the care of elderly people. Rather, this decision is guided by individual patient need and the caregiving structures available to them. This care may benefit those who are managing multiple chronic conditions or experiencing significant age-related complications that threaten quality of daily life. Geriatric care may be indicated if caregiving responsibilities become increasingly stressful or medically complex for family and caregivers to manage independently.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cognitive disorder</span> Mental health condition affecting cognitive functions

Cognitive disorders (CDs), also known as neurocognitive disorders (NCDs), are a category of mental health disorders that primarily affect cognitive abilities including learning, memory, perception, and problem solving. Neurocognitive disorders include delirium, mild neurocognitive disorders, and major neurocognitive disorder. They are defined by deficits in cognitive ability that are acquired, typically represent decline, and may have an underlying brain pathology. The DSM-5 defines six key domains of cognitive function: executive function, learning and memory, perceptual-motor function, language, complex attention, and social cognition.

The USC Leonard Davis School of Gerontology is one of the seventeen academic divisions of the University of Southern California in Los Angeles, focusing in undergraduate and graduate programs in gerontology,

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Memory and aging</span> Aspect of senescence

Age-related memory loss, sometimes described as "normal aging", is qualitatively different from memory loss associated with types of dementia such as Alzheimer's disease, and is believed to have a different brain mechanism.

Gerontechnology is an inter- and multidisciplinary academic and professional field combining gerontology and technology. Sustainability of an aging society depends upon our effectiveness in creating technological environments, including assistive technology and inclusive design, for innovative and independent living and social participation of older adults in any state of health, comfort and safety. In short, gerontechnology concerns matching technological environments to health, housing, mobility, communication, leisure and work of older people. Gerontechnology is most frequently identified as a subset of HealthTech and is more commonly referred to as AgeTech in Europe and the United States. Research outcomes form the basis for designers, builders, engineers, manufacturers, and those in the health professions, to provide an optimum living environment for the widest range of ages.

Brain training is a program of regular activities purported to maintain or improve one's cognitive abilities. The phrase “cognitive ability” usually refers to components of fluid intelligence such as executive function and working memory. Cognitive training reflects a hypothesis that cognitive abilities can be maintained or improved by exercising the brain, analogous to the way physical fitness is improved by exercising the body. Cognitive training activities can take place in numerous modalities such as cardiovascular fitness training, playing online games or completing cognitive tasks in alignment with a training regimen, playing video games that require visuospatial reasoning, and engaging in novel activities such as dance, art, and music.

Cognitive deficit is an inclusive term to describe any characteristic that acts as a barrier to the cognition process.

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Working memory training is intended to improve a person's working memory. Working memory is a central intellectual faculty, linked to IQ, ageing, and mental health. It has been claimed that working memory training programs are effective means, both for treating specific medical conditions associated with working memory deficit, as and for general increase in cognitive capacity among healthy neurotypical adults.

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Memory improvement</span> Act of improving ones memory

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Childhood memory</span> Early life experiences often memorable for life

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Attentional control</span> Individuals capacity to choose what they pay attention to and what they ignore

Attentional control, colloquially referred to as concentration, refers to an individual's capacity to choose what they pay attention to and what they ignore. It is also known as endogenous attention or executive attention. In lay terms, attentional control can be described as an individual's ability to concentrate. Primarily mediated by the frontal areas of the brain including the anterior cingulate cortex, attentional control is thought to be closely related to other executive functions such as working memory.

Time-based prospective memory is a type of prospective memory in which remembrance is triggered by a time-related cue that indicates that a given action needs to be performed. An example is remembering to watch a television program at 3 p.m. In contrast to time-based prospective memory, event-based prospective memory is triggered by an environmental cue that indicates that an action needs to be performed. An example is remembering to send a letter after seeing a mailbox. While event-based memory is dependent on the environment, time-based prospective memory is self-initiated; one must specifically monitor the passage of time.

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Margie E. Lachman is an American psychologist. She is the Minnie and Harold Fierman Professor of Psychology at Brandeis University, director of the Lifespan Developmental Psychology Lab and the director of the Boston Roybal Center for Active Lifestyle Interventions. She was editor of the Journal of Gerontology: Psychological Sciences (2000-2003), and has edited two volumes on midlife development. She is a fellow of the American Psychological Association, Division 20 and the Gerontological Society of America. Lachman's research is in the area of lifespan development with a focus on midlife and later life. Her current work is aimed at identifying psychosocial and behavioral factors that can protect against, minimize, or compensate for declines in cognition and health. She is conducting studies to examine long-term predictors of psychological and physical health, laboratory-based experiments to identify psychological and physiological processes involved in aging-related changes, especially in memory, and intervention studies to enhance performance and promote adaptive functioning through active engagement and physical activity.

References

  1. ↑ "Zelinski Named Head of Center for Digital Aging" Archived 2016-02-16 at the Wayback Machine USC-Davis. Retrieved 2016-02-04.
  2. ↑ Fernandez, Alvaro. "Brain Training: No Magic Bullet, Yet Useful Tool" . Retrieved 20 March 2012.
  3. ↑ "Elizabeth Zelinski Faculty Profile". USC Davis School of Gerontology. Archived from the original on 27 January 2012. Retrieved 20 March 2012.
  4. ↑ Arbuckle, Steve. "Elizabeth Zelinski Named Interim Dean". USC News. Archived from the original on 26 August 2011. Retrieved 20 March 2012.
  5. ↑ "Brain Age: Keeping Your Brain Stimulated" . Retrieved 20 March 2012.
  6. ↑ Zelinski, Elizabeth. "Scientific Critique of BBC/Nature Brain Training Experiment" . Retrieved 20 March 2012.
  7. ↑ Hamilton, Jon. "Study: Aging Brains Can Benefit from 'Training'". NPR. Retrieved 20 March 2012.
  8. ↑ Begley, Sharon. "Brain Training: How It Works". The Daily Beast. Retrieved 20 March 2012.
  9. ↑ Bezaitis, Athan. "The Workforce Landscape — Graying but Gritty". Aging Well. Retrieved 20 March 2012.
  10. ↑ "Keeping Your Brain Fit". CBS News. Retrieved 20 March 2012.
  11. ↑ Boyles, Salynn. "Today's Seniors Are Smarter: Tests Suggest Less Mental Decline for Current Generation of Elderly". WebMD. Retrieved 20 March 2012.
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