Related Experiment Video
Updated: Nov 9, 2025

Highlighting and Reducing the Impact of Negative Aging Stereotypes During Older Adults' Cognitive Testing
Published on: January 24, 2020
Hearing impairment and missing cognitive test scores in a population-based study of older adults: The Atherosclerosis
Jennifer A Deal1,2,3,4, Alden L Gross1,5,6, A Richey Sharrett1
1Department of Epidemiology, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, Maryland, USA.
Introduction:
Hearing impairment is associated with poor cognitive test performance in older adults. However, hearing's impact on cognitive test completion is poorly described, and missing cognitive data due to hearing impairment could misestimate the association.
Methods:
We investigated if hearing impairment is associated with missing neurocognitive scores in 3678 adults (72-94 years). Hearing impairment was defined by the better-ear pure tone average of speech-frequency thresholds (0.5-4 kHz) >25 decibels.
Results:
Hearing impairment was associated with greater missingness on all auditory-only tests, including Logical Memory (prevalence ratio [PR] comparing ≥ moderate impairment vs normal hearing:1.68, 95% confidence interval [CI] 1.26, 2.25) and Digits Backwards (PR 1.62; 95% CI 1.21, 2.17); and two non-auditory tests, Boston Naming (PR 1.61; 95% CI 1.21, 2.17) and Trail Making B (PR 1.55; 95% CI 1.29, 1.86). Models that imputed missing cognitive scores showed the strongest hearing-cognition associations.
Discussion:
Older adults with hearing impairment are less likely to complete cognitive testing, thereby underestimating the hearing impairment-cognition relationship.
More Related Videos
07:30Evaluation of the Cognitive Performance of Hypertensive Patients with Silent Cerebrovascular Lesions
Published on: April 23, 2021
06:23The 4 Mountains Test: A Short Test of Spatial Memory with High Sensitivity for the Diagnosis of Pre-dementia Alzheimer's Disease
Published on: October 13, 2016
Related Concept Videos
Atherosclerosis II: Clinical Manifestations and Diagnostic Tests
Cognitive Development During Adulthood