Lost in Thought or Just Lonely? Everyday Cognitive Competence in Middle Adulthood

Everyday cognitive competence refers to the ability to manage cognitively demanding tasks essential for maintaining functional independence. While cognitive abilities are well explored in explaining individual differences in everyday cognitive competence, growing attention has been directed toward the impact of non-cognitive factors like loneliness. This study aims to investigate how executive function (EF) components-updating, inhibition, and task shifting-predict everyday cognitive competence and whether loneliness explains the additional variance beyond EF processes. To account for the multifaceted nature of everyday cognitive competence, both performance-based (Everyday Problems Test-EPT) and self-reported measures (Cognitive Failures Questionnaire-CFQ) were administrated. The sample included 176 middle-aged adults (ages 43-65), a group suitable for investigating predictors of everyday cognitive competence in the early stages of cognitive aging. The findings reveal that updating is a significant predictor of the performance on the EPT, while loneliness is not. When self-reported cognitive lapses are considered, loneliness emerges as a significant predictor. The lack of a relationship between the EPT and CFQ, along with their differing associations with EF, loneliness, and sociodemographic factors, suggests they assess distinct aspects of everyday cognitive competence. This highlights the need for a multidimensional assessment framework to gain a comprehensive understanding of everyday cognitive competence in middle-aged adults.