Partnering With Communities to Understand Lifestyle Influences on Cognitive Decline

This seminar will highlight community-engaged and population-based research focused on understanding and addressing cognitive aging and Alzheimer’s disease disparities among Black older adults. The talk will describe partnerships with Black communities in Los Angeles to understand community priorities related to brain health, caregiving, education, and lifestyle approaches to wellness. The seminar will also discuss how social stressors, such as everyday discrimination, relate to cognitive aging. Together, this work demonstrates how community context, lifestyle-related stress, and social experiences shape cognitive health over time, underscoring the need for research and interventions that center lived experience, trust, and equity to reduce Alzheimer’s disease disparities.

Learning Objectives:

1. Describe how community-engaged research informs culturally relevant approaches to brain health.

2. Explain the role of social factors in shaping cognitive aging and Alzheimer's disease.

3. Identify strategies for equity in research.