Associations Between Parity and Cognition: Race/Ethnic Differences

BACKGROUND: Race/ethnicity is associated with differences in reproductive history and cognition individually, yet it remains an understudied factor in the relationship between parity and later-life cognition. OBJECTIVE: To evaluate if the association between parity and cognition differs between racial/ethnic groups. METHODS: Participants included 778 older, postmenopausal women from the Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (Latina: n = 178, Non-Latino Black [NLB]: n = 169, Non-Latino White [NLW]: n = 431) who self-reported at least one birth. Cognitive outcomes included working memory, learning memory, and verbal fluency. Covariates included age, education, cardiovascular and other reproductive health factors, adult socioeconomic status (SES) and depressive symptoms. We fit a series of linear models to examine a) whether parity was associated with cognitive functioning, b) if this association varied by race/ethnicity through parity by race/ethnicity interactions, and c) individual parity with cognition associations stratified by race/ethnicity. RESULTS: In the full sample, parity was significantly negatively associated with Digit Symbol Substitution Test (DSST) performance (b = –0.70, p = 0.024) but not Animal Fluency or word-list learning and memory. Tests of race/ethnicity-by-parity interactions were not statistically significant (ps > 0.05). However, stratified analyses by race/ethnicity showed a differential effect of parity on DSST performance, such that parity was significantly negatively associated with DSST performance (b = –1.66, p = 0.007) among Latinas but not in NLWs (b = –0.16, p = 0.74) or NLBs (b = –0.81, p = 0.191). CONCLUSION: Among Latina, but not NLB or NLW women, greater parity was associated with worse processing speed/executive functioning later in life. Further research is needed to understand the mechanisms driving racial/ethnic differences.