ABSTRACT
Characteristics established in early life, including educational attainment and brain size, have been implicated as risk factors for dementia and intellectual decline in late life. In particular, low educational attainment has been shown to be a risk factor for prevalent dementia (Bowirrat, Friedland, Farrer, Baldwin, & Korczyn, 2002; Callahan, Hall, Hui, Musick, Unverzagt, & Hendrie, 1996; Canadian Study of Health and Aging, 1994; Chibnall & Eastwood, 1998; Dartigues et al., 1991; De Ronchi, Fratiglioni, Rucci, Paternico, Graziani, & Dalmonte, 1998; Haan, Mungas, Gonzalez, Ortiz, Acharya, & Jagust, 2003; Hall et al., 1998; Kokmen, Beard, O'Brien, & Kurland, 1993; Ott et al., 1995; Precipe M., Casini, Ferretti, Lattanzio, Fiorelli, & Culasso, 1996; Ravaglia et al., 2002; Schmand et al., 1997; Zhang et al., 1990) and incident dementia (Di Carlo et al., 2002; Evans et al., 1997; Fratiglioni et al., 1997; Karp, Kareholt, Qiu, Bellander, Winblad, & Fratiglioni, 2004; Launer et al., 1999; Letenneur, Gilleron, Commenges, Helmer, Orgogozo, & Dartigues, 1999; Lindsay et al., 2002; Ott, van Rossum, van Harskamp, van de Mheen, Hofman, & Breteler, 1999; Stern, Gurland, Tatemichi, Tang, Wilder, & Mayeux, 1994; Wilson et al., 2002; Zhang, Katzman, Yu, Liu, Xiao, & Yan, 1998), although a few studies have failed to confirm this association (Beard, Kokmen, Offord, & Kurland, 1992; Cobb, Wolf, Au, White, & D'Agostino, 1995; Graves et al., 1996a).
