Cognitve Functoning among Elders with Symptoms of Depression: The Case of Two Selected Insttutonalized Care Centers in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia Ephrem Habte * and Tefera Tekle School of Psychology, College of Educaton and Behavioral Studies, Jigjiga University, Jigjig, Ethiopia * Corresponding author: Ephrem Habte, School of Psychology, College of Educaton and Behavioral Studies, Jigjiga University, Jigjig, Ethiopia, Tel: +251913277801; Fax: 360-650-7447; E-mail: efrisych@gmail.com Received date: 11 April 2018; Accepted date: 04 June 2018; Published date: 13 June 2018 Copyright: © 2018 Habte E, et al. This is an open-access artcle distributed under the terms of the creatve commons atributon license, which permits unrestricted use, distributon and reproducton in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. Citaton: Habte E, Tekle T (2018) Cognitve Functoning among Elders with Symptoms of Depression: The Case of Two Selected Insttutonalized Care Centers in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Health Sci J Vol. 12 No. 3: 572. Abstract Objectves: Old age is accompanied by diferent forms of physical and psychological problems. This study aimed to investgate cognitve functoning among elders with symptoms of depression. Methods: This study employed a cross-sectonal descriptve survey. In this study, 116 partcipants were purposefully selected out of 148 elders from two insttutonalized care centers in Addis Ababa with inclusive criteria. The instruments of data collecton were GDS-15 and MMSE. Mean, Standard deviaton, t-test, ANOVA and Pearson correlaton coefcient were used as methods of data analysis. Results: This study showed that the elders had high rate of depression (68.1%). In additon, 87.1% of elders had declined cognitve functoning. Similarly, the study indicated that there was statstcally signifcant inverse relatonship between depression and cognitve functoning (r=-0.48, p<0.01). Elders without partners had manifested higher symptoms of depression. Conclusion: The fnding revealed that depression and cognitve decline were higher among the elders. Females had lower cognitve functoning compared to their male counterparts. An increased age and lower level of literacy were associated with lower cognitve functoning and higher symptoms of depression and the married elders had higher score in MMSE compared to others. We suggest that further research is needed to be conducted on non-insttutonalized elders. Keywords: Depression; Cognitve; Geriatric Introducton Old age is defned in diferent ways by diferent groups, societes and countries. Terms such as elderly, older person and old age are ofen used interchangeably referring to people who are 60 and above [1,2]. The old age starts in the sixtes [1]. However, others contended that the period of old age includes people with the age of 65 and above. So, there is no clear demarcaton points concerning the period of old age [3]. However, the UN defnes aging in relaton to people whose age is 60 years and above [4]. This defniton has gained acceptance in the Ethiopian context as it coincides with the country’s ofcial retrement age [2]. Hence, in this study, terms elderly and older people are, therefore, used interchangeably referring to all people aged 60 and above. United Naton’s Statstcal report indicated that 962 million people, 13% of the global populaton, were estmated to be 60 and above [4]. In Ethiopia, there were more than 4.2 million elders in 2013 [5]. This fgure is projected to 5.2 million by the year 2020 [6]. Old age is highly accompanied by various forms of physical and psychological problems compared to other stages of development [7-9]. Similarly, depression and anxiety are among the commonly reported psychological problems among the elders [10]. Accordingly, this paper aimed at investgatng the cognitve functoning among elders with symptoms of depression. Depression is ranked as the fourth leading cause of disability worldwide and the organizaton projected that by 2020 it will be the second leading cause of death [11]. According to the WHO, more than 300 million people throughout the world sufer from depression [12]. Almost one in every four-elderly people, for example, sufers from serious cognitve decline, which is a major risk factor for later development of dementa [13,14]. Moreover, depression symptoms are prominent conditon amongst older people, with a signifcant impact on the well-being and quality of life. Scholars clearly depicted that the prevalence of depressive symptoms increases with age and ofen accompanied by declined cognitve functoning among elders [15-17]. Depressive symptoms are not lone indicators of psychological well-being but are also recognized as signifcant predictors [16]. Researchers have witnessed that, generally Africa, specifcally; Ethiopia is characterized by famine, drought, disease and civil conficts. These factors substantally decrease coping skills among the elderly [7]. Research Article iMedPub Journals www.imedpub.com DOI: 10.21767/1791-809X.1000571 Health Science Journal ISSN 1791-809X Vol.12 No.3:571 2018 © Copyright iMedPub | This article is available from: www.hsj.gr 1