Espenes disputerer for ph.d.- graden i helsevitenskap og vil offentlig forsvare avhandlingen:
“Dementia Disease Initiation: Demographically adjusted norms based on Scandinavian samples and comparison with published norms from North America”
Prøveforelesning over oppgitt emne starter kl. 09.15 / The trial lecture starts at 09.15
Tittel/Title: “Normal aging, cognitive decline, and cognitive reserve”.
Prøveforelesningen strømmes her / The trial lecture will be streamed here
Disputasen starter kl. 11.15 / The defense starts at 11.15
Disputasen strømmes her / The defense will be streamed here
De som ønsker å opponere ex auditorio kan sende en e-post til leder av disputasen innen kl. 13:00 disputasdagen / If you want to oppose ex. auditorio, send an e-mail to the leader of the defence before 13:00 on the day of the defence:
matthias.mittner@uit.no
Populærvitenskapelig sammendrag av avhandlingen/ Summary of the thesis
Health care professionals and researchers frequently assess individuals using cognitive tests. To judge test performance, results are analyzed using norms which are reference points describing the expected performance of healthy individuals. However, in Scandinavian countries, local norms are lacking, and patients are frequently compared to individuals from North America without knowledge on the validity of these comparisons. Thus, the main aim of this thesis was to develop local norms on three popular neuropsychological tests based on Norwegian and Swedish healthy adults using a regression-based procedure.
Compared to norms from North America, results indicated less difference between individuals with high or low age, high or low educational attainment, and less difference between men and women on verbal memory tests. As a result, the North American norms were on average too strict for individuals with high educational attainment and/or younger age, and too lenient for individuals with low educational attainment and/or advanced age. The norms presented in this thesis may improve the validity of cognitive assessments in Scandinavian countries.
Veiledere/ Supervisors:
Hovedveileder/Main supervisor:
Førsteamanuensis Bjørn-Eivind Kirsebom, Institutt for psykologi, Det helsevitenskapelige fakultet, UiT Norges arktiske universitet.
Biveileder/supervisor:
Professor Knut Kuvås Waterloo, Institutt for psykologi, Det helsevitenskapelige fakultetUiT Norges arktiske universitet.
Bedømmelseskomité/Defensecomitee:
Professor Kevin Duff, Layton Aging & Alzheimer's Disease Center / Department of Neurology, Oregon Health & Science University – 1. opponent.
Førsteamanuensis Rune Raudeberg, Institutt for biologisk og medisinsk psykologi, UiB – 2. opponent.
Førsteamanuensis Kamilla Rognmo, Institutt for psykologi, Det helsevitenskapelige fakultet, UiT Norges arktiske universitet – leder av komité.
Disputasleder/ Leader of defense:
Professor Matthias Mittner, Institutt for psykologi, Det helsevitenskapelige fakultet, UiT Norges arktiske universitet.