https://www.dpa-international.com/trends-and-features/urn:newsml:dpa.com:20090101:261022-99-32894/
https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/busy-social-life-linked-slower-090333153.html
Older people should aim for a hectic and varied calendar to give themselves a better shot at preserving memory and mental sharpness, according to a team of Chinese doctors whose findings have been published by the British Medical Journal.
Be that volunteering at community events or training a football team or regular games of cards or bingo or chess, keeping the mind occupied with a mix of friendly faces, chat and challenges “could slow the decline in brain health associated with ageing,” the BMJ said.
Based at Shandong University and Guangdong Medical University, the researchers said in their paper that being involved in several forms of “social activity” appeared to help with “promoting brain health in older adults.”
After looking at data for over 57,000 people in China, Europe and the U.S., the team assessed that those involved in “three or more activities” appeared to perform better cognitively than others who had developed a less varied range of engagements.
Doing volunteer work and helping out at sports clubs were “consistently associated with better cognitive function” than other types of engagement, the researchers said, adding that the “positive associations” were stronger among women, the more educated and those were not diagnosed as depressed.
People who were not overweight, who lived alone and in the countryside and who smoked and drank – possibly as they do so in social settings such as pubs – were more likely to benefit from the association.
No cause-and-effect could be proven, however, the team explained, as their study, which appeared in the BMJ’s Journal of Epidemiology & Community Health, was mostly “observational.”
