Measuring Recollection and Familiarity in Ageing and Mild Cognitive Impairment

What is this research about?

Memory is important for many aspects of life. It helps maintain our sense of who we are, reminiscing with others helps maintain social relationships, and recalling how we did things in the past helps direct future behaviour. However, our ability to use our memories in these ways depends on how we are able to retrieve information from memory. Research agrees that there are two processes in memory: recollection - a recall-like process where when something or someone is recognised other thoughts, images, or associations come to mind about where that person or thing was previously encountered; and familiarity - when something is recognised as being familiar but no other information is retrieved. When cognitive abilities decline in ageing and dementia the primary process to be impaired is recollection, but research on how familiarity processes change in ageing has not produced consistent results. I am a psychologist with particular interest in these memory processes and in understanding how they work when cognitive ability is reduced. This research will compare recently developed measures of recollection and familiarity in different populations: younger adults, older adults, and individuals with Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI). The goal is to develop a sensitive measure of memory impairment for help with early diagnosis of dementia.

Why is this important?

The well-being of our ageing population is an important issue for the social sciences. Dementia currently costs the UK over £26 billion per year and with the increasing ageing population it is predicted that by 2025 over 1 million people in the UK will be living with dementia. While some memory loss is expected with age, the memory problems experienced in dementia can seriously impact patients' well-being, and take an emotional toll on families, couples, and caregivers. However, if dementia is diagnosed at an early stage, much can be done to help people overcome problems and improve quality of life. It is thus critical to develop a better understanding of the specific memory processes that are impaired in early stages of dementia, and use this knowledge to inform care pathways that will improve well-being.

How will this research be organised?

Project 1: How best to measure recollection and familiarity. This project will compare different recently developed, theoretically driven, measures of these processes in younger adults to establish which method is the most sensitive and reliable. This will enable the best methodology to be used in Projects 2 and 3.

Project 2: How do recollection and familiarity processes change in normal ageing. This project will compare younger and older adults' memory using the best method(s) obtained from Project 1. This will enable the methods to be further refined so that they are suitable for use with older people.

Project 3: How are recollection and familiarity impaired in Mild Cognitive Impairment. MCI is a pre-clinical phase of dementia where cognitive impairment is greater than expected for age and education level. This project will compare recollection and familiarity in healthy older people and individuals diagnosed with MCI. This will help us understand the particular patterns of memory impairment that characterise early stages of dementia and will help refine the methodology further for use in clinical settings.

What impact will this research have?

The main impact of this research will be increased understanding of how memory is impaired in early dementia. Results will be shared with academics and clinicians who research and deliver psychological treatments for dementia with the aim of applying for further collaborative grant funding to test and validate the results of this research in clinical settings. This research will also be used to promote social science research to the general public. The results will be presented at public engagement events and on a project website.

This programme of research will benefit four key stakeholders: (a) older adults with dementia, (b) clinicians/public sector, (c) the general public and (d) academics in the fields of memory, cognitive ageing, and neuropsychological impairment:

(a) Older adults with dementia

This research is the first stage in a longer-term research trajectory that will benefit older adults with dementia through development of a reliable method for testing recollection and familiarity processes in memory. The proposed research includes testing of novel methodologies and procedures will be refined across the three Projects such that a sound platform is developed that can later be adapted for use in memory clinics. The test will be developed to be sensitive to the memory impairments characteristic of Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI) and thus it will improve the ability of clinicians to detect changes in memory processes that are indicative of pre-clinical dementia. The long-term benefits of this research will be to enhance quality of life for older adults with dementia.

(b) Clinicians/public sector

With our ageing population, dementia places an ever-increasing burden on the NHS. Early diagnosis of dementia has been shown to delay the need for nursing home care. In the US a study estimated that a delay of only one month could save over $4 billion. Early diagnosis also permits clinicians to put in place appropriate therapeutic interventions at an earlier stage.
There will be long-term benefits for clinicians and the public sector (NHS) as results of the proposed research will inform diagnoses and thereby care pathways. Stakeholders will be engaged through established links between Prof Edelstyn (mentor) and clinicians within the North Staffordshire NHS Trust. A planned programme of knowledge exchange activities throughout the life-cycle of the grant (see Pathways to Impact for details) will ensure that results are communicated widely. This will enable potential long-term impacts on public policy and services to be achieved.

(c) The general public

The general public are an important beneficiary of this research. In the short-term, this research will be disseminated to the general public (through a series of planned events, both local and national) alongside broader information on the memory changes associated with ageing and dementia. Media engagement and the project website will also raise public access to research findings and implications. In the longer-term, this research will benefit the general public by improving the health and well-being of the UK's ageing population by increasing understanding of how memory processes change in healthy ageing and the early stages of dementia.

(d) Academics interested in memory, cognitive ageing, and neuropsychological impairment

There is currently a knowledge gap between cognitive psychologists interested in theoretical understanding of memory processes, researchers interested in cognitive ageing, and neuropsychologists who test these processes in specific populations. This research builds on evidence from all three of these areas and the PI and the research mentor will work collaboratively to bridge this gap. Results will be disseminated to these groups via a range of international conferences and high impact publications (detailed in the Case for Support and Pathways to Impact attachments).
Finally, this research will be central to the development of the applicant's leadership skills. Through a series of collaborations (with Prof Edelstyn, Prof Bodner, and clinicians) and a programme of training and professional development, the applicant will develop her international research profile and forge lasting networks with important and influential contacts in both academia and the public sector. This will further the applicant's career aspirations and will enable the applicant to lead and contribute to research in this field for the foreseeable future.