Age-related differences in typical intellectual engagement between young and old adults

BACKGROUND/STUDY CONTEXT: Typical intellectual engagement has been postulated as a trait-like construct that can explain interindividual differences in the extent of engaging in cognitively challenging tasks. Although formulated within the framework of cognitive development, the developmental aspects of typical intellectual engagement itself have not been studied yet.

Three hundred thirty-four participants from the Zurich Longitudinal Study on Cognitive Aging (73 years on average, ranging from 60 to 85) and 468 graduate students (21 years on average, ranging from 18 to 25) were administered a self-rating scale on typical intellectual engagement. Structural equation modeling was used to study differences in factor means, differences in factor variances, and differences in factor covariances between the two groups.

Significant mean-level differences between age groups exhibit both decline and increase in old age. An increase in factor variances was shown in the old. Factor correlations were higher in old age compared to young adults.

Both higher and lower mean levels in the old group imply that typical intellectual engagement is a variable that contributes incremental information compared to well-known measures of basic personality traits. Larger variances in the old imply greater heterogeneity in the old sample, which fits into literature on fan-spread phenomenon. Higher factor covariances in the old imply dedifferentiation of typical intellectual engagement in the old.