| Publication Abstract Display | | Type: Poster | | Title: Psychological acculturation and cognition among older Latinos living with and without HIV. | | Authors: Breton J, Kamalyan L, Paredes AM, Guarena LA, Watson WM, Cherner M, Moore RC, Marquine MJ | | Date: 02-03-2021 | | Abstract:Objective: Higher degrees of acculturation have been associated with better cognitive performance among older Hispanics/Latinos/as/x (henceforth Latinos), though this appears to be attenuated in the presence of brain pathology. Most studies have assessed acculturation via measures that incorporate language use/bilingualism, which have been separately associated with cognition. This study aimed to examine: 1) whether a measure that assesses psychological acculturation (and does not include language use) is associated with cognition among Latinos; and 2) whether this association might differ between Latinos with and without HIV.
Participants and Methods: Participants included 95 older Latinos (female 43%, mean age=63.4±11.1, mean years of education=13.0±4.0, 77% of Mexican origin/descent, 42% primarily Spanish-speaking) living with (n=53) and without (n=46) HIV enrolled in the HIV in Older Latinos (HOLA) study at the University of California San Diego HIV Neurobehavioral Research Program. Participants completed the Psychological Acculturation Scale (PAS), which assesses emotional connection to and knowledge of both Anglo-American and Latino cultures, with higher scores indicating increased psychological acculturation (range 1 to 9). Our main outcome was fluid cognition T-scores from the NIH Toolbox Cognition Module, which were adjusted for age, education, sex, and race/ethnicity with separate norms for English- and Spanish-speakers. A multivariable linear regression was conducted to identify independent and interactive effects of acculturation and HIV status on cognition.
Results: Latinos with HIV were younger, had less years of education, and were more likely to be male and primarily Spanish-speaking (ps<.02) than Latinos without HIV. There were no significant differences on level of acculturation between Latinos with (M=44.3; SD=18.2) and without (M=48.5; SD=15.2) HIV (p = .23). We did not find a significant effect of acculturation (Estimate= -.06, SE=.07, p=.38) on cognition, nor a significant interaction between HIV status and acculturation on cognition (p=.69).
Conclusions: Findings from these cross-sectional analyses indicate that psychological acculturation is not associated with cognition over and above the effect of demographics among older Latinos with or without HIV. The lack of a significant association between acculturation and cognition in our comparison group is at odds with prior findings, and might be explained by the fact that our measure of acculturation did not include language. Future studies considering both acculturation and language use/bilingualism might shed further light onto whether the previously found effect of acculturation on cognition is mediated by language factors. |
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