Abstract
Cognitive epidemiology explores cognitive ability as a risk factor for various health and disease-related outcomes. To support research in this area, the Understanding America Study (UAS)–a nationally representative online probability sample–has developed and collected longitudinal assessments of multiple cognitive domains (e.g., fluid intelligence, executive function, processing speed, verbal episodic memory). These assessments have been compiled into the Cognitive Comprehensive File (CogCF), a publicly available resource of cognitive test data for over 21,000 adults aged 18 years and older. While valuable on its own, the CogCF may also be linked to an extensive range of other publicly available data collected in the UAS, including the complete Health and Retirement Study survey instrument and additional surveys on topics such as job history, personality, financial and psychological wellbeing, healthcare usage, and physical and mental health. These data enable researchers to examine critical questions such as the associations of cognitive ability with everyday life outcomes and factors associated with cognitive changes over the life course.
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Data availability
Data from the dataset are publicly available through the UAS data portal while logged in on the UAS website (https://uasdata.usc.edu/index.php?r=eNpLtDKyqi62MrFSKkhMT1WyLrYyNAeyS5NyMpP1UhJLEvUSU1Ly80ASQDWJKZkpUKahoZmRknUtXDB_yBMQ). Documentation for the dataset can be found in the “UAS Cognitive Comprehensive File Data Description” document (https://uasdata.usc.edu/page/Cognitive+Comprehensive+File).
Code availability
Code to generate all figures and tables, and example code for merging with other UAS files, are available at https://osf.io/9jp36/files/osfstorage.
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Acknowledgements
The majority of funding for the UAS comes from a cooperative agreement with the National Institute on Aging (NIA) of the National Institutes of Health (1U01AG077280), with substantive cofounding from the Social Security Administration. This work was also supported by the NIA grant R01AG068190 and the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health grant K01OH012739.
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Raymond Hernandez did the data analyses and wrote the first draft of the manuscript. Margaret Gatz, Stefan Schneider, Ying Liu, and Deborah Finkel conceived the project and edited the manuscript. Jill Darling and Bart Orriens developed and implemented the cognitive test surveys. Yadira Garcia supported data collection. Funding acquisition was provided by Tania Gutsche and Arie Kapteyn. The final manuscript was read, reviewed, and approved by all authors.
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Gatz, M., Darling, J.E., Schneider, S. et al. An online population-representative longitudinal cognitive dataset from the Understanding America Study. Sci Data (2026). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41597-026-07050-4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41597-026-07050-4
