Negative Aging Stereotypes Impair Performance on Brief Cognitive Tests Used to Screen for Predementia

International audience ; Objectives: There is today ample evidence that negative aging stereotypes impair healthy older adults’ performance oncognitive tasks. Here, we tested whether these stereotypes also decrease performance during the screening for predementiaon short cognitive tests widely used in primary care.Method: An experiment was conducted on 80 healthy older adults taking the Mini Mental State Examination (MMSE)and the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) under Threat or Reduced-threat condition.Results: Stereotype threat significantly impaired older adults’ performance on both tests, resulting in 40% of older adultsmeeting the screening criteria for predementia, compared with 10% in Reduced-threat condition (MMSE and MoCAaveraged).Discussion: Our research highlights the influence of aging stereotypes on short cognitive tests used to screen for predementia.It is of critical importance that physicians provide a threat-free testing environment. Further research should clarifywhether this socially induced bias may also operate in secondary care by generating false positives.