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Handbook of the Life Course pp 451–488Cite as

Cognitive Development and the Life Course: Growth, Stability and Decline

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Part of the book series: Handbooks of Sociology and Social Research ((HSSR))

Abstract

This chapter explores the integration of life course and developmental approaches to the understanding of cognitive growth, maintenance, and decline over the life span. We employ the idea of event-centered growth models as an essential contribution that at once brings more contextual factors into developmental models of cognitive function (CF) and shows how the life course approach can contribute to an understanding of a phenomenon that is otherwise viewed as a developmental (or aging) process. After introducing the concepts, theories, and methods necessary for understanding the main focus of our attention—namely within-person change in CF—we apply this framework to four major areas where our approach can potentially lead to new insights and understandings: (1) early child cognitive development and the transition to school; (2) the transition to adulthood and midlife, in which CF in adolescence leads to major influences on educational achievement, occupational success and CF in adulthood; (3) the potential for changes in CF during midlife; and (4) transitions in later life (e.g. health events and labor force transitions),and how theoretically CF has a role to play as both consequence and cause of these transitions. The approach we propose can be applied to the study of a wide array of developmental phenomena where life course events and transitions play a role.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    One exception is Newcomb’s Bennington studies (see Alwin et al. 1991), which studied political attitudes over nearly 50 years in the lives of their respondents. Another exception is the Terman study of gifted children (Friedman and Kern 2014; Kern and Friedman 2008).

  2. 2.

    The molar stability coefficient is an estimate of the persistence of behavior or behavioral orientations as expressed in age-homogenous rates of change over specified periods of time. The concept was introduced as a means of organizing empirical information on human constancy and change, and of comparing raw stability estimates across studies having different re-measurement intervals and across different concepts (see Alwin 1994, pp. 155–158; Alwin 1995, pp. 233–238). As distinct from other concepts of stability (see Alwin 1994), molar stability is defined as βj/k where β is the cohort-specific or age-homogenous stability estimate observed empirically, k is the number of years over which raw stability is assessed, and j is the number of years selected to express molar stability. In the examples used in this chapter, j = 8.

  3. 3.

    In this discussion normative stability refers to the preservation of individual differences in a quality within a constant population over a specified amount of time, whereas molar stability refers to the persistence of a quality as expressed in the rate of change for an age-homogenous cohort over a specified period of time. As used here, the term normative stability simply refers to molar stability in the entire population, not broken down by cohort (see Alwin 1994, p. 139).

  4. 4.

    Because of the limitations on space, we do not discuss these models in detail here and introduce them primarily to provide a conceptual orientation to the study of within-person change, the central concept used throughout this chapter. Further discussion of these models for those uninitiated into the study of within-person change and the SEM approach may wish to consult introductory material on change models (see, e.g. Alwin n.d.).

  5. 5.

    Todd and Wolpin (2003) identify a useful example using a model in which child achievement is regressed on family income, the number of books in the home, and additional covariates. The issue arises with the interpretation of the estimated effects—increasing the number of books, while holding family income constant, implies a reduction in some other area of family consumption which may include child investment (e.g., fewer educational toys; assuming these inputs are purchased). Thus, the estimated effect is potentially confounded with a change in the level of an additional (unobserved) input.

  6. 6.

    We employ structural equation methods in this analysis, and focus on the total rather than direct effects of variables in a causal model (see Alwin 1988). The details of our treatment of the WLS data, including the measures and modeling strategies used, are given in Alwin et al. (2008a).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Sociology and Demography, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA, USA

    Duane F. Alwin & Jason R. Thomas

  2. Biobehavioral Health, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA, USA

    Linda A. Wray

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  1. Department of Sociology, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, North Carolina, USA

    Michael J. Shanahan

  2. Life Course Center and Department of Sociology, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA

    Jeylan T. Mortimer

  3. Department of Sociology, Washington State University, Pullman, Washington, USA

    Monica Kirkpatrick Johnson

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Alwin, D.F., Thomas, J.R., Wray, L.A. (2016). Cognitive Development and the Life Course: Growth, Stability and Decline. In: Shanahan, M., Mortimer, J., Kirkpatrick Johnson, M. (eds) Handbook of the Life Course. Handbooks of Sociology and Social Research. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-20880-0_21

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