A viewpoint on change point modeling for cognitive aging research: Moving from description to intervention and practice

Chronological age is a commonly-used time metric, but there may be more relevant time measures in older adulthood. This paper reviews change point modeling, a type of analysis increasingly common in cognitive aging research but with limited application in applied research. Here, we propose a new application of such models for cognitive training studies. Change point models have the potential to assess intervention outcomes such as compression of morbidity or reduced decline after an event (e.g., reduced cognitive decline after a dementia diagnosis) as well as changes in outcome trajectories across different intervention dosages (e.g., initial vs. booster training). Through change point modeling, we can better understand how interventions impact cognitive aging trajectories.