Background

Anxiety has been recognized as an important factor in detecting cognitive decline in old age, but research on this topic is sometimes conflicting or inconclusive.

Objectives

The aim of the present study is to provide a review of existing literature on the relationship between anxiety state and task--oriented cognitive functions in order to identify the nature of such a relationship.

Material and methods

All relevant literature published between 2008 and 2020 was searched using four scientific databases (Pubmed, CINAHL, Embase and PsycINFO). The terms in a list of emotion-related and task-related items as search terms in conjunction with “emotion, task, performance and older people” were used to identify relevant research articles from the mentioned electronic databases.

Results

As a result of this review, anxiety is associated with decreased memory and executive function among cognitive functions. While anxiety and depression were negatively associated with cognitive function, anxiety was not a major predictor of cognitive decline in older adults. Although we could not clearly confirm a relationship between anxiety and cognitive functions, these findings provide an interesting possibility of interpretation of the psychological mechanisms in older adults. These results support the conclusion that a relationship with specific human emotions, such as anxiety, might exist for people with declining cognitive functions.

Conclusions

This suggestion could be applied to various environments. Further studies confirming the possibility of predicting anxiety through multi-dimensional analysis of human variations should be promoted.