This study tested an expanded version of the explanatory model of the negative impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on mental health proposed by Milman and colleagues. Participants (N = 680) completed an online survey on demographic variables associated with poor pandemic mental health, COVID-19 stressors, mental health symptoms, and pandemic-related psychological processes we hypothesized as mediating mechanisms explaining the negative mental health effects of the COVID-19 stressors. Results indicated that these psychological processes (core belief violation, meaning made of the pandemic, vulnerability, and mortality perception) explained the severity of mental health symptoms to a far greater extent than COVID-19 stressors and demographics combined. In addition, these psychological processes mediated the impact of COVID-19 stressors on all mental health outcomes. Specifically, COVID-19 stressors were associated with increased core belief violation, decreased meaning making, and more intense perceived vulnerability and mortality. In turn, those whose core beliefs were more violated by the pandemic, who made less meaning of the pandemic, and who perceived a more pronounced vulnerability and mortality experienced a worse mental health condition. This study’s results suggest some possible ways of intervention in pandemic-like events useful for limiting such impact at the individual, group, social and political levels.

Discovering why some people’s cognitive abilities decline more than others is a key challenge for cognitive ageing research. The most effective strategy may be to address multiple risk factors from across the life-course simultaneously in relation to robust longitudinal cognitive data. We conducted a 12-year follow-up of 1091 (at age 70) men and women from the longitudinal Lothian Birth Cohort 1936 study. Comprehensive repeated cognitive measures of visuospatial ability, processing speed, memory, verbal ability, and a general cognitive factor were collected over five assessments (age 70, 73, 76, 79, and 82 years) and analysed using multivariate latent growth curve modelling. Fifteen life-course variables were used to predict variation in cognitive ability levels at age 70 and cognitive slopes from age 70 to 82. OnlyAPOEe4 carrier status was found to be reliably informative of general- and domain-specific cognitive decline, despite there being many life-course correlates of cognitive level at age 70.APOEe4 carriers had significantly steeper slopes across all three fluid cognitive domains compared with non-carriers, especially for memory (β = −0.234,p < 0.001) and general cognitive function (β = −0.246,p < 0.001), denoting a widening gap in cognitive functioning with increasing age. Our findings suggest that when many other candidate predictors of cognitive ageing slope are entered en masse, their unique contributions account for relatively small proportions of variance, beyond variation inAPOEe4 status. We conclude thatAPOEe4 status is important for identifying those at greater risk for accelerated cognitive ageing, even among ostensibly healthy individuals.

Identifying predictors of cognitive decline in old age helps us understand its mechanisms and identify those at greater risk. Here, we examined how cognitive change from ages 11 to 70 is associated with cognitive change at older ages (70 to 82 years) in the Lothian Birth Cohort 1936 longitudinal study ( N = 1,091 at recruitment). Using latent-growth-curve models, we estimated rates of change from ages 70 to 82 in general cognitive ability ( g) and in three cognitive domains: visuospatial, memory, and processing speed. We found that g accounted for 71.3% of interindividual change variance. Greater cognitive gain from ages 11 to 70 predicted slower decline in g over 12 subsequent years (β = 0.163, p = .001), independently of cognitive level in childhood and at age 70, and domain-specific change beyond g. These results contribute to the goal of identifying people at higher risk of age-related cognitive decline.

The negative impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on mental health has been extensively documented, while its possible positive impact on the individual, defined as Post-Traumatic Growth (PTG), has been much less investigated. The present study examines the association between PTG and socio-demographic aspects, pre-pandemic psychological adjustment, stressors directly linked to COVID-19 and four psychological factors theoretically implicated in the change processes (core belief violation, meaning-making, vulnerability and mortality perception). During the second wave of the pandemic 680 medical patients completed an online survey on direct and indirect COVID-19 stressors, health and demographic information, post-traumatic growth, core belief violation, meaning-making capacity, feelings of vulnerability and perceptions of personal mortality. Violation of core beliefs, feelings of vulnerability and mortality, and pre-pandemic mental illness positively correlated with post-traumatic growth. Moreover, the diagnosis of COVID-19, stronger violation of core beliefs, greater meaning-making ability, and lower pre-existing mental illness predicted greater PTG. Finally, a moderating effect of meaning-making ability was found. The clinical implications were discussed.

Enhancing transparency in scientific reports is crucial to foster trust, facilitate reproducibility, and ensure the integrity of research, ultimately advancing the progress of knowledge and innovation. To devise strategies for enhancing transparency in scientific reports, the initial step is to assess the current state: to objectively measure the current level of transparency, identifying its shortcomings and associated factors, and to gauge improvements, for instance, following interventions. Here we present a new tool and a proof of concept to this endeavor. Using a checklist, we evaluated the methods transparency of a corpus of 180 papers published in 2011 and 2021 in five top-tier psychology journals. We specifically focused on the materials, procedures, and characteristics of population and sample. We summarized the level of transparency in the methods of each paper with the Transparency Of Methods (TOM) score. This score consists of the proportion of relevant information regarding the method that is available to the reader of a scientific report, either in the main text of the paper, or the appendixes, supplementary materials, and online open repository. It ranges from 0 (i.e., no transparency in the relevant aspects of the methods and materials) to 1 (i.e., the scientific report is fully transparent in all the relevant materials and methods). The results affirm TOM’s potential for assessing the transparency of scientific reporting and offer two snapshots of transparency in the methods of published papers, a decade apart. While they indicate progress has been made, there remains room for further enhancements and highlight specific areas that require attention. In conclusion, this work underscores the ongoing need for improvement in methods’ transparency and introduces a valuable tool, demonstrating its applicability as a means to evaluate the transparency of scientific reports.