Time-Based prospective memory predicts insight into functional abilities among community-dwelling older adults

Accurate appraisal of one's own abilities (i.e., insight) is necessary for appropriate compensatory behaviors and sustained independence during aging. Although insight is often purported to be related to executive functioning (EF), nuanced understanding of the cognitive correlates of insight for functional abilities among nondemented older adults is lacking. Because insight shares neuroanatomic underpinnings with time-based prospective memory (PM), the present study examined the contributions of time-based PM, beyond event-based PM and other potential cognitive confounds (i.e., episodic memory, time estimation, and EF), in predicting insight into one's own performance on instrumental activities of daily living (IADLs) among community-dwelling older adults.

A group of 88 nondemented, community-dwelling older adults completed performance-based measures of time- and event-based PM, episodic memory, time estimation, and EF, as well as IADL tasks followed by self-appraisals of their own IADL performance as indices of insight.

Time-based PM was moderately-to-strongly associated with insight, beyond event-based PM, time estimation, and episodic memory [F(1,83) = 11.58, p = .001, η² = .122], as well as beyond EF and demographic covariates [F(1,79) = 10.72, p = .002, η² = .119].Specifically, older adults who performed more poorly on a time-based PM task overestimated the efficiency of their own IADL performance to a greater extent.

Findings suggest that nondemented older adults with poorer time-based PM may be more prone to inaccurately appraising their functional abilities and that this vulnerability may not be adequately captured by traditional EF measures.