Andrew Sommerlad and Marko Elovainio
Dementia is the most feared aspect of ageing and is a major global health challenge, so identifying lifestyle factors that can reduce memory decline, and possibly prevent dementia from occurring, is a research priority. In our study, recently published in the IJE, we explored whether having more frequent contact with friends and family, or being married, is linked to better memory and language in older age.
We found that having more social contact and being married in mid-life were both linked to having better cognitive performance over the next 20 years. In particular, we found that verbal fluency was the cognitive area with the strongest link to social contact.
IJEblog 