Work that stimulates the work of the mind protects against dementia in old age. This conclusion has come an international group of scientists from Sweden, Finland, Great Britain and the United States, which published research results in British Medical Journal.
Experts analyzed the connection between the cognitive stimulation and the risk of dementia in 107,896 participants (42 percent of men, the average age of 45 years old) from the seven studies of the IPD-Work Consortium, the purpose of which was to study the work related to the work of psychosocial factors with chronic diseases, disabilities and mortality . In addition, an association was studied between cognitive stimulation and proteins that prevent the formation of links between cells of the brain, in 2261 randomly selected volunteers and the relationship between proteins and the risk of dementia at 13,656 participants.
Cognitive stimulation was measured at the beginning of the study, and the mental health of the participants tracked on average for 17 years. After accounting for potential mixing factors, including age, gender, the level of education and lifestyle, it was found that the risk of dementia was lower for participants with high cognitive stimulation compared to low cognitive stimulation at work (the frequency of the disease is 4.8 per 10 thousand people years in a group with high stimulation and 7.3 in a group with low stimulation).
Researchers did not find differences between men and women or those younger and over 60 years old, but there were signs that the connection was stronger for Alzheimer’s disease than for other dementia. It turned out that cognitive stimulation was also associated with lower levels of three proteins associated with Alzheimer’s disease.
Cognitive-stimulating work includes complex tasks and a high degree of freedom of decision-making, and less active passive work is characterized by low demands and absence of control.