Early-life cognitive enrichment constitutes the causal variable; global AD pathology score, the intervening variable; and rate of cognitive decline, the outcome. The estimates are given as standardized coefficients (standard error), with P values derived from a path analysis including age at death, sex, and educational level as the covariates. The line’s thickness is proportional to the relative effect sizes of the estimates, and dashed lines indicate insignificant associations. The result shows that direct relation of ELCE with the rate of cognition decline constituted 80% and the indirect relation through AD pathology score constituted 20% of the total association of higher levels of ELCE with slower rates of late-life cognitive decline.