BRIEF REPORT: Hostility, Forgiveness, and Cognitive Impairment over 10 Years in a National Sample of American Adults

• Main Authors: Green, E. (Author), Kennedy, K. (Author), Shields, G.S (Author), Slavich, G.M (Author), Toussaint, L.L (Author), Travers, S. (Author)
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: American Psychological Association Inc. 2018
• Subjects: adult; Adult; aged; Aged; Aged, 80 and over; Aging; American; Article; Cognition; cognitive defect; Cognitive Dysfunction; demography; disease association; female; Female; follow up; forgiveness; Forgiveness; Health; hostility; Hostility; human; Humans; Longitudinal Studies; longitudinal study; major clinical study; male; Male; middle aged; Middle Aged; multiple regression; pathophysiology; physiology; prediction; psychologic assessment; psychological resilience; questionnaire; social status; Surveys and Questionnaires; time factor; Time Factors; United States; very elderly
• Online Access: View Fulltext in Publisher

 Objective: We examined the extent to which self-forgiveness and forgiveness of others moderated the association of hostility with changes in cognitive impairment over 10 years in a nationally representative sample of adults in the United States. Method: Participants were 1,084 respondents to the Americans' Changing Lives survey, a longitudinal study of American adults. Hostility, self-forgiveness, forgiveness of others, and cognitive impairment were measured at baseline, and cognitive impairment was assessed again at follow-up. Moderated multiple regression analyses tested whether self-forgiveness and forgiveness of others moderated the association of hostility with changes in cognitive impairment over time, controlling for baseline cognitive impairment and relevant sociodemographic and clinical factors. Results: As hypothesized, greater hostility levels at baseline predicted more cognitive impairment 10 years later, β = .08, p < .01. In addition, self-forgiveness at baseline moderated the association between baseline hostility and cognitive impairment at follow-up, β = -.07, p < .01. Decomposing this interaction revealed that hostility significantly predicted increased cognitive impairment at follow-up for individuals with low, β = .15, p < .001, and average, β = .08, p = .001, levels of self-forgiveness but not for persons with high levels of self-forgiveness, β = .03, p < .34. In contrast, forgiveness of others was not a significant moderator. Conclusions: Greater hostility is associated with the development of more cognitive impairment over 10 years, and being more self-forgiving appears to mitigate these hostility-related effects on cognition. Enhancing self-forgiveness may thus represent one possible strategy for promoting cognitive resilience in adulthood. © 2018 American Psychological Association.