Introduction
cognitive impairment, Cabaco, MCI, Alzheimer’s disease, depression, AD
SECONDARY
The current situation derived from the mental health effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, the increase in problems of loneliness in the elderly, the social distancing, or the institutionalization itself in older adults living in Residential Care Facilities (RCFs) [Older adults with depression tend to recall more negative past experiences than positive, this in turn creates a negative bias that reinforces and increases the current emotional lability [Recent studies show that reminiscence therapy helps improve autobiographical memories, also making it possible to rewrite personal experiences [Among the different types of reminiscence programs, REMPOS was developed by Cabaco [There are cultural differences between Mexico and Spain in the understanding of quality of life and the components associated with it. Thus, in Spain, external elements such as social relations and satisfaction with the environment are considered more relevant for quality of life, while for Mexico internal elements, such as health and functional capacity, are more important [In addition, it has been proposed that culture influences the relationship between personality and life satisfaction, a relationship that is also mediated by affective balance. For example, a study compared samples from individualistic and collectivist cultures [This study aims to analyze the cross-cultural differences in the efficacy of the REMPOS therapy program in comparison to a standard classic intervention (cognitive stimulation) in terms of life satisfaction and autobiographical memory. In addition, a secondary aim is to verify the differential efficacy of the REMPOS program in healthy older people and older people with different levels of deterioration. There are three main hypotheses: H1 There is a cross-cultural difference in the effect of the REMPOS program compared to a control condition on the LSI-A scores; H2 There is a cross-cultural difference in the effect of the REMPOS program compared to a control condition on the EPOS scores; and H3 There is a cross-cultural difference in the effect of the REMPOS program compared to a control condition on the ENEG scores. To gain deeper insights into the analysis, we tested these three hypotheses in three different aging categories, namely healthy aging (HA), mild cognitive impairment (MCI), and Alzheimer’s disease (AD). These hypotheses required three independent variables: condition (experimental and control groups), time of testing (pre- or postintervention), and country, namely Mexico and Spain, constituting the cross-cultural comparison. On the other hand, our dependent variables encompass the test scores, specifically those from the Life Satisfaction Inventory (LSI-A) and the autobiographical memory test (AMT). This design allowed us to measure and compare the effects of both types of therapies in each country across all three different aging categories.