Browsing by Author "Torres, Stephanie"
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Item Early Life Determinants of Late-Life Cognition: Stress and Adversity Across the Lifespan and its Long-Term Impacts on Cognition(2022-12-15) Torres, Stephanie; Medina, Luis D.; Woods, Steven P.; Yoshida, Hanako; Zahodne, Laura B.Across populations, it is not uncommon for people to experience one or more adverse events in childhood. The effect of stress on cognition has been examined at discrete periods of development (e.g., childhood, adulthood, and older adulthood) but not extensively studied from a longitudinal perspective. The purpose of this study was to examine the association between early-life adversity/childhood adversity (CADV) and cumulative lifecourse adversity (CLADV), via salivary cortisol, with cognitive functioning in mid-late life. Two models were assessed: the first, examined the relationship between CADV and cognition and the second examined the relationship between CLADV and cognition. Both the direct effects and the indirect effects were assessed. The indirect effects pathway examined whether the effect of CADV and CLADV are mediated through physical health (PH) and mental health/psychological well-being (MHW). Multigroup analyses were carried out to determine whether sex differences were present. Results from the current study revealed childhood adversity predicts executive functioning (EF) and episodic memory (EM) in late midlife, with this association being mediated by both mental/psychological well-being and physical health. Similar results were noted when examining the association between cumulative lifecourse adversity and both cognitive domains. Results confirmed hypotheses that the relationships between adversity and cognitive functioning is largely mediated by MHW and PH, given that early life adversity can lead to a cascade of challenges and more adversity across the lifespan, which may “weather down” individuals over time. Findings from these analyses noted that the measurement of how adversity impacts cognitive functioning differs between females and males. Exploratory analyses which assessed the moderating role of parental affection on adversity’s effect on cognition revealed that it did not significantly moderate either the direct or indirect relationships between adversity (childhood and cumulative lifecourse) and EF and EM abilities. Overall, this work highlights the importance of bolstering well-being across the lifespan rather than limiting target interventions to a specific point in development by showing the influence adversity has on cognition in later life is mediated through MHW and PH factors.Item English Minority Students in Ghana: How Language of Test Administration and Regional Differences Influence Reading Performance on the Ghanaian Achievement Test(2019-08) Torres, Stephanie; Grigorenko, Elena L.; Hart, Lesley; Kulesz, Paulina A.It is estimated that roughly 40% of the world’s population lacks access to education in their native tongues. The impact of language of instruction and NDLL (nondominant language learner) status on academic achievement has received significant attention, but less attention has been given when considering degree of urbanization of where children reside and go to school; thus, careful consideration should be given to how cultural differences across regions in low- and middle- income countries may affect performance patterns when children are being taught in their non-dominant language. Here we consider the impact of language of test administration and degree of urbanization on reading performance on the Ghanaian Achievement Test (GAT) in a large sample (N = 1,309, Mage = 9.48 years, SD = 2.26; 45.5% Female) of Ghanaian children. Those included in this study are from a survey project carried out by The Education Quality for All (EQUALL) Complimentary Education Program in 2005. All participants completed demographics measures and assessments measuring different competencies such as nonverbal intelligence, language, and reading ability. Negative binomial and zero-inflated Poisson data models revealed that both language of test administration and degree of urbanization were significantly related to reading subskill ability and noted differences in predicted scores between NDLLs and DLLs (dominant language learners). Effects of the degree of urbanization and language of test administration varied by subskill, contrary to what we hypothesized. We expected a fairly linear relationship between all GAT reading subskill scores and degree of urbanization, but in some cases semi-urban local language speakers outperformed both their urban- and rural-dwelling counterparts.