occupation

Complex occupations help protect our brains from aging-related cognitive decline

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Cog­ni­tive aging: Work helps our brain (AAAS):

A recent study shows that work plays an active role in keep­ing our brains healthy. “We have demon­strat­ed the role of work­ing activ­i­ty on cog­ni­tive per­for­mance”. Pro­fes­sor Raf­fael­la Rumiati says … “Many stud­ies have been focused on the fac­tors influ­enc­ing our brain aging and dif­fer­ences in cog­ni­tive decline have been often observed in asso­ci­a­tion with edu­ca­tion or oth­er relat­ed to qual­i­ty of life. From our analy­sis it emerges that the type of work activ­i­ty also con­tributes to the dif­fer­ences in nor­mal and patho­log­i­cal cog­ni­tive aging”. [Read more…] about Com­plex occu­pa­tions help pro­tect our brains from aging-relat­ed cog­ni­tive decline

Jobs with low physical stress and good working conditions linked to larger hippocampus and better memory

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CSU study links phys­i­cal stress on the job with brain and mem­o­ry decline in old­er age (press release):

A new study out of Col­orado State Uni­ver­si­ty has found that phys­i­cal stress in one’s job may be asso­ci­at­ed with faster brain aging and poor­er memory.

Aga Burzyn­s­ka, an assis­tant pro­fes­sor in the Depart­ment of Human Devel­op­ment and Fam­i­ly Stud­ies, and her research team con­nect­ed occu­pa­tion­al sur­vey respons­es with brain-imag­ing data from 99 cog­ni­tive­ly nor­mal old­er adults, age 60 to 79. They found that those who report­ed high lev­els of phys­i­cal stress in their most recent job had small­er vol­umes in the hip­pocam­pus and per­formed poor­er on mem­o­ry tasks. The hip­pocam­pus is the part of the brain that is crit­i­cal for mem­o­ry and is affect­ed in both nor­mal aging and in dementia.

[Read more…] about Jobs with low phys­i­cal stress and good work­ing con­di­tions linked to larg­er hip­pocam­pus and bet­ter memory

Alzheimer’s Risk and Prevention: the Cognitive Reserve

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A cou­ple of recent research find­ings are mak­ing the media rounds, bring­ing much need­ed atten­tion to the high Alzheimer’s rates among Lati­nos and to pre­ven­tive approach­es based on the Cog­ni­tive Reserve — such as, what jobs we choose:

More Alzheimer’s risk for His­pan­ics, stud­ies find (Inter­na­tion­al Her­ald Tribune):

- Stud­ies sug­gest that many His­pan­ics may have more risk fac­tors for devel­op­ing demen­tia than oth­er groups, and a sig­nif­i­cant num­ber appear to be get­ting Alzheimer’s ear­li­er. And sur­veys indi­cate that Lati­nos, less like­ly to see doc­tors because of finan­cial and lan­guage bar­ri­ers, more often mis­take demen­tia symp­toms for nor­mal aging, delay­ing diagnosis.

- “This is the tip of the ice­berg of a huge pub­lic health chal­lenge,” said Yani­ra Cruz, pres­i­dent of the Nation­al His­pan­ic Coun­cil on Aging. “We real­ly need to [Read more…] about Alzheimer’s Risk and Pre­ven­tion: the Cog­ni­tive Reserve