title: Association of depression and loneliness with specific cognitive performance in non-demented elderly males.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Loneliness and depression are very common in the aged population. Both have negative impacts on cognition in the elderly. The present study aimed to investigate the effect of loneliness and depression on total as well as specific cognitive domains in cognitively normal male subjects.
  
  
  METHODS
  A total of 189 cognitively normal male subjects were recruited and underwent Cognitive Abilities Screening Instrument (CASI) and Wechsler Digit Span Task tests. Depression was assessed by the Geriatric Depression Scale-Short Form (GDS-SF) and loneliness by UCLA loneliness scales. Partial correlation test was used to explore the correlation between loneliness/depression and total as well as specific cognition function, with the controlled factors of age and education.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Both depression and loneliness are negatively correlated with global cognitive function as evaluated with CASI (r=-0.227, p=0.002; r=-0.214, p=0.003, respectively). The domains of Attention, Orientation, Abstraction and judgment, and List-generating fluency of cognitive function were specifically associated with loneliness, and the domain of orientation was associated with depression after controlling the factors age and years of education.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Our findings suggest that loneliness and depression may have negative impacts on global and specific domains of cognitive function in non-demented elderly males. Both loneliness and depression should be actively recognized earlier and appropriately treated because they are significant sources of cognitive impairment in the elderly.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Mackay Memorial Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan.
authors.forename: Ruu-Fen
authors.initials: RF
authors.lastname: Tzang
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Taipei Veterans General Hospital, Taiepi, Taiwan.
authors.forename: Albert C
authors.initials: AC
authors.lastname: Yang
authors.affiliation: Taipei Veterans Home, New-Taipei City, Taiwan.
authors.forename: Heng-Liang
authors.initials: HL
authors.lastname: Yeh
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Taipei Veterans General Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan.
authors.forename: Mu-En
authors.initials: ME
authors.lastname: Liu
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Taipei Veterans General Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan.
authors.forename: Shih-Jen
authors.initials: SJ
authors.lastname: Tsai
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D000375:Aging; D003071:Cognition / Q000502:physiology*; D003072:Cognition Disorders / Q000150:complications*; D003863:Depression / Q000150:complications*; D006801:Humans; D008132:Loneliness; D008297:Male; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D011594:Psychometrics; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D013624:Taiwan