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Cognitive decline in aging

Risks

Retirement

Rowhwedder and Willis argue that there is a strong relationship between cognition decline and retirement.Furthermore, the extensive research, which was conducted in the past few years, has practically confirmed the plausibility of the theory. Rohwedder and Willis explain the nature of their theory by referring to the “unengaged lifestyle hypothesis”. They have discovered that a lifestyle transition from cognitive stimulating environment to a less stimulating one may create favorable conditions for the cognitive decline of a person. In addition, the level of dependence between cognitive decline and retirement is very much influenced by the employment status of the person. It is concluded that intellectual work is more beneficial than the labor work. For instance, there are evidences that even years after the retirement from an intellectual work, cognitive performance is still preserved.

Health and well-being

A feeling of personal accomplishment is strongly influenced by the person’s health. But, due to biological irreversibility in the human body such as cell division deterioration, it becomes more vulnerable to illnesses with ageing. Furthermore, a decrease on the person’s well-being often leads to impair performance in daily activities, loss of interest, fatigue, loss of confidence and finally to depression. Thus, a decline in cognitive performance is caused. According to the “common cause” theory of aging which links physical health and cognitive performance, there are certain biological processes such as oxidative stress and hormonal changes, which affect cognition. In addition, the cardiovascular disease, which is an age-associated illness, has strong relation with cognitive decline, because it leads to interruption in blood flow, causing permanent or temporary impairment in the brain function. Finally, cognitive impairment is also considered to be influenced by obesity. Numerous studies have been undertaken in order to prove that relation. For example, one of them, which was conducted with 2,200 healthy participants between the age of 32 and 62, emphasized that the higher body mass corresponds to less cognitive scores.

Environmental conditions

-air pollution –It is well known that air pollutants can severely damage human lung. But new studies have also identified air pollutants as the main culprit for cardiovascular disease, which leads to cognitive decline.

-socioeconomic status–The connection between the social environment and cognitive decline in later age is not fully agreeable and consistent. However, lower socio-economic status leads to stress, unhealthy food, poor nutrition and less education, which researchers consider as causes for cognitive decline.

-Psychological stress – the connection between stress and cognitive performance is purely biological. Conditions like post-traumatic stress disorder and chronic stress lessened the hippocampal volume. This pathological changes cause memory and learning problems.

Interventions

Cognitive interventions

These days we speak more about cognitive interventions as a way for improving abilities which slightly decrease in elders. People need to be encouraged to use appropriate strategies of learning and remembering for improving their performance. The most popular method is memory training. In which adults use different technics as mnemonic, concentration and attention strategies, personal insight and self-monitoring for improving their cognitive performance in dual-shifting, visual search, recognition ,recall ,spatial perception and memory efficiency . According to Wilkinson, cognitive therapy is a good method for reducing the depression and anxiety, which are common sufferings of elders. In a cognitive-behavior study run by Galleghren Tohmpson and Steffren, which was conducted with men in the average age of 62, 72 percent of the participants showed no sign of depression after the therapy.

Social interventions

People usually isolate themselves after their retirement, because they have lost their social environment. That is why social programs, which aim to integrate those isolated people back in the society, have a huge positive impact on the cognitive health. Different types of socialization lead to better outcomes. Recently new programs, where elders meet young adults, reveal the positive effects of keeping alive the connection between generations. Furthermore, internet social networks like Facebook and Twitter are also really helpful to overcome isolation, because they let people keep in touch all the time from and all over the world. In addition, having a Facebook or Twitter account is easy, cheap and does not require physical activity which makes it suitable in later age, especially for people with disabilities.

Nutritional interventions

The role of dietary fiber in slowing-down the cognitive decline in aging has a big support in scientific circles. Supplements such as B-9 andB-12 as well as Omega-3 fatty acid are essential for the robust operation of the memory and the brain. It is believed that antioxidant vitamins, vegetables and fruits increase the aging neurons activity and help them to work properly. In contrast, a diet which is reach in sugar and cholesterol often leads to poorer cognitive abilities in elderly people.. Although a lot of researches have been conducted supporting the link between nutrition and their effects in healthy aging, further exploration needs to be done.

Physical activity interventions

Cardiovascular fitness and Cardiorespiratory fitness are both beneficial in terms of cognitive improvement in elderly people. In the meta-analysis study run by Colcombe and Kramer, researchers have found that mutual exercises of both aerobic training and strengths and flexibility training have better influence on cognitive performance than practicing only one of them. Cardiorespiratory fitness can influence cognitive performance in old people in couple of ways:

1. Reduce the risk of diabetes, cardiovascular disease and hypertension. All of them have a strong link with cognitive decline.

2. Another positive benefit is reducing the cerebral blood flow which can cause stroke in later age.

3.Connection between nerve growth and cardiorespiratory fitness has been reported in experiments, conducted on mice. However, further investigation is needed to prove this connection.

Preventions

There is no cure or medicine, which can stop cognitive decline, but the numerous studies lead researchers to find the right way of slowing the process down.

The World Health Organization suggests 3 ways for preventing the cognitive decline in elderly people.

1.With providing education and learning throughout life.

2.Support the active participation of people in economic activities and voluntary work

3.Encourage participation in family community.

Education

Education has strong correlation with cognitive decline in later age, because educated people are most likely to have a healthy lifestyle. Furthermore, people engaged with intellectual activity have better cognitive performances than those who exercise labor work supported by the theory of “use-it or lose-it”. According to Katzman, “education increases brain reserve by increasing synaptic density in neocortical association cortex, leading to a delay of symptoms by 4 to 5 years in those with AD (and probably, other dementing disorders) hence halving the prevalence of dementia.” (p. 17). He supported his theory by pointing out that educated people have synaptic density which delays the symptoms of decline for couple of years. Thus, it is concluded that education has a vital role in keeping the brain healthy.

Healthy lifestyle

Healthy lifestyle has an impact on later cognition. Confronting unhealthy habits like smoking and drinking reduce the chance of cognitive decline. Eating foods rich in Omega-3 and fruit like blackberry improves cognitive capacity. According to “cognitive reserve” theory, there is a need of occupied lifestyle (physical and mental) not only in late age, but through your whole life. In this way people enrich their “cognitive capacity” leading to delay in the cognitive decline.

SenseCam

In recent years devises, which aim to foster brain preservation, flood the market. Most of them are not scientifically proven, but some are based on truthful researches like SenseCam. This devise, which originates from a research conducted in Cambridge University and Bangor University, aims to recollect memory of day to day activities like drawing the attention to different pictures collected during the day. One of its main purposes is to help people that suffer from depression and dementia. However, it is also suitable for preventing cognitive decline, because it has positive impacts on the human memory and attention.