Stephanie Simone

• Master of Arts
• PhD Student at Temple University

Background Race differences on cognitive tests have been widely reported and attributed to psychosocial factors. Cognitive assessment via performance‐based tests of everyday functioning may be less influenced by psychosocial factors, offering ecologically valid and less/unbiased measurement. This study examined differences between Black/African Ame...

Background Healthy lifestyle behaviors (e.g., physical activity, cognitive activity) protect against cognitive decline and reduce dementia risk. Alzheimer’s disease (AD) neuropathology begins several years before the onset of clinical symptoms and disability; thus, midlife may be a critical time during which healthy lifestyle behaviors may be most...

Background The Goal‐Control Model posits that episodic memory impairment leads to premature decay of everyday task goals, which contributes to task omissions (failure to accomplish task steps) in those with moderate to severe impairment. Although task omissions are not observed in those with mild episodic memory (mildEM) impairment, it has yet to b...

Background The impact of depressive symptoms on everyday function in older adults remains poorly understood. Depression may decrease motivation, impair cognition, and/or bias self‐reports of functional ability. The present study examined relations between depressive symptoms and everyday function as measured by self‐report, informant‐report, and an...

Background Greater physical activity (PA) is associated with better cognitive and vascular health, but accurate assessment of PA is challenging. Self‐report questionnaires of PA may be compared against objective measures from smartwatch sensors; the correspondence between measures may be influenced by a variety of factors such as cognition or age....

Background Mild functional difficulties begin in mild cognitive impairment (MCI) and precede functional disability, but people with MCI generally perform at ceiling on performance‐based tests of everyday function. This study examined whether inefficient reaching, touching, and extra movements (i.e., micro‐errors) on a performance‐based test (Natura...

Background Objective and sensitive measures of everyday function are needed for accurate clinical diagnosis and evaluation of outcomes in clinical trials for dementia. However, most objective everyday function measures are difficult to administer and have not been validated against biomarkers of Alzheimer’s disease (AD) neuropathology. This study e...

Modifiable risk factors account for nearly half of dementia cases, with the greatest impact on dementia prevention in midlife (ages 45-64). Little is known about what motivates middle-aged adults to engage in healthy behaviors for dementia risk reduction. This study examined associations between motivation to make lifestyle changes for dementia ris...

INTRODUCTION: Intrinsic motivation is critical for dementia prevention but remains poorly understood. METHODS: A total of 347 middle-aged adults completed questionnaires on intrinsic factors for dementia prevention, demographics, dementia risk, and healthy lifestyle behaviors. Latent profile analysis (LPA) grouped participants with similar intrinsi...

Objectives Sensory impairment is a hypothesized risk factor for cognitive decline; however, the psychosocial pathways are not well understood. We evaluated whether the association between visual impairment (VI) and cognitive decline was partially mediated via depressive symptoms, loneliness, or social activity. Methods We used data from 2601 older...

Preliminary validity of a computer‐based test of everyday function (Virtual Kitchen Challenge [VKC]) was examined against brain‐imaging markers of cerebrovascular disease and in contrast to conventional neuropsychological and self‐report measures. Twenty community‐dwelling older adults ( n = 6 mild cognitive impairment) performed simulated breakfas...

Background Cognitive reserve and brain maintenance may explain individual differences in trajectories of cognitive and brain aging due to various life exposures (e.g., education, cognitive enrichment). Cognitive reserve refers to the advantages that life exposures exert on cognitive abilities despite brain aging or disease; brain maintenance refers...

Background It is well known that mild cognitive impairment (MCI) is associated with subtle functional decline. However, standardized and cost‐effective methods for the objective quantification of mild functional difficulties are lacking. Here we report preliminary validity data for a novel, non‐immersive virtual‐reality task (Virtual Kitchen Challe...

Background It is well known that mild cognitive impairment (MCI) is associated with subtle functional decline. However, standardized and cost‐effective methods for the objective quantification of mild functional difficulties are lacking. Here we report preliminary validity data for a novel, non‐immersive virtual‐reality task (Virtual Kitchen Challe...

Objective Accurate early detection of subtle cognitive difficulties is critical for optimizing treatment of neurodegenerative disease. Those who speak English as a second language (ESL) in the US may be at a disadvantage on Englishwritten neuropsychological tests, increasing the potential for error, particularly when cognitive difficulties are mild...

Objective There has been relatively little research on the effect of childhood attention difficulties/weaknesses and learning disabilities/differences on cognitive aging. This study examined associations between self-reported symptoms and diagnoses/concerns of childhood attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and reading or math learning di...

Objective The goal-control model of the functional impairment in dementia posits two different underlying mechanisms: decay of task goals (reduced task accomplishment) and poor control over goal execution (high error rates). Here we present a case series in which we explore the effects of a performance-based, functional intervention on two particip...

Objective Cognitive performance, particularly in the domains of memory and executive functioning (EF), have been shown in previous research to predict decline in everyday functioning in older adults. The goal-control model posits that episodic memory difficulties cause weak or decaying task goals that lead to the omission of every day task steps (l...

Objective The relation between depressed mood and functional difficulties in older adults has been demonstrated in studies using self-report measures and has been interpreted as evidence for low mood negatively impacting everyday functional abilities. However, few studies have directly examined the relation between mood and everyday function using...

Objective Self-reported mild functional difficulties are one of the most salient predictors of future cognitive decline in older adults. However, few measures of objective assessment of mild functional difficulties are available. This study explored the validity and stability of novel, performance-based measures of subtle functional difficulties in...

Objective Modifiable risk factors (e.g., cognitive/physical inactivity) account for up to 40% of dementia cases. The impact of risk reduction is strongest in midlife (ages 45–64), but little is known about what motivates middle-aged adults to engage in healthy lifestyle behaviors for dementia risk reduction. Method 347 participants (M age = 54.67,...

Objective Smartwatches may be used to promote behavior changes to improve brain and cognitive health. This study examined the effect of feedback from smartwatches on perceived behavior change in healthy older adults. Method Twenty older adults without dementia were screened and recruited (M age = 68.2, SD = 6.79) from the community. Participants w...

Background Mild difficulties with daily tasks are associated with cognitive abilities and future cognitive decline but are difficult to measure objectively. Performance‐based tests with high task demands (e.g., multitasking, prospective memory) have been fruitful in capturing mild functional difficulties, however measuring certain aspects like over...

Loneliness has been linked to morbidity and mortality across the lifespan. Social media could reduce loneliness, though research on the relation between social media and loneliness has been inconclusive. This study used person-centered analyses to elucidate the inconsistencies in the literature and examine the possible role technology barriers play...

Women show disproportionate burden of Alzheimer’s disease (AD) pathology and higher AD dementia prevalence compared to men, yet the mechanism(s) driving these vulnerabilities are unknown. There is sexual dimorphism in immunologic functioning and neuroimmune processes are implicated in AD genesis. Using neuropathology indicators from human brain tis...

The National Alzheimer’s Coordinating Center (NACC) maintains a national database of clinical and cognitive data collected under a standard protocol set by the National Institute on Aging (NIA) called the Uniform Data Set (UDS). Development of factor scores unbiased by race/ethnicity will allow for comparison of other lifestyle and psychosocial fac...

Stroke and death remain risks of surgical aortic valve replacement (SAVR). Preoperative cognitive screeners repeatedly show that reduced scores predict postoperative outcome, but less is known about comprehensive neuropsychological measures predicting risk. This study had two aims: 1) investigate whether preoperative cognitive measures predicted po...

Women show disproportionate burden of Alzheimer’s disease (AD) pathology and higher AD dementia prevalences compared to men, yet the mechanisms driving these vulnerabilities are unknown. There is sexual dimorphism in immunologic functioning, and neuroimmune processes are implicated in AD genesis. Using neuropathology indicators from human brain tis...

Postoperative cognitive dysfunction (POCD) has been reported with widely varying frequency but appears to be strongly associated with aging. Outside of the surgical arena, chronic and acute cerebral hypoxia may exist as a result of respiratory, cardiovascular, or anemic conditions. Hypoxia has been extensively implicated in cognitive impairment. Fu...

Objective: This review describes the relatively small body of neuropsychological and cognitive research conducted over the past 100 years focused on theoretical models explaining the neurocognitive processes that support everyday functioning and the breakdown of functional abilities in the face of neurological damage or disease. Method: The hist...

Performance-based functional tests for the evaluation of daily living activities demonstrate strong psychometric properties and solve many of the limitations associated with self- and informant-report questionnaires. Virtual reality (VR) technology, which has gained interest as an effective medium for administering interventions in the context of h...

The original and second editions of the California Verbal Learning Test (CVLT) used nonparametric and parametric methods, respectively, to assess Total Recognition Discriminability (RD). In a previous study, we found evidence that the nonparametric formula may be more sensitive than the parametric formula to high false positive (FP) rates and provi...