Cognitive Dispersion Serves As a Marker of Vulnerability to Decline in a Longitudinal Study of Cognitively Normal Older Adults

Depression increases risk for cognitive decline, potentially through greater variability in performance, also known as cognitive dispersion. Data from 287 older adults in the Harvard Aging Brain Study shows that higher depression is related to lower and more variable cognitive performance. Greater cognitive dispersion predicted steeper decline over 8.68 years.