Festini Sara B, McDonough Ian M, Park Denise C
Center for Vital Longevity, School of Behavioral and Brain Sciences, University of Texas at Dallas Dallas, TX, USA.
Center for Vital Longevity, School of Behavioral and Brain Sciences, University of Texas at DallasDallas, TX, USA; Department of Psychology, The University of AlabamaTuscaloosa, AL, USA.
Front Aging Neurosci. 2016 May 17;8:98. doi: 10.3389/fnagi.2016.00098. eCollection 2016.
Sustained engagement in mentally challenging activities has been shown to improve memory in older adults. We hypothesized that a busy schedule would be a proxy for an engaged lifestyle and would facilitate cognition. Here, we examined the relationship between busyness and cognition in adults aged 50-89. Participants (N = 330) from the Dallas Lifespan Brain Study (DLBS) completed a cognitive battery and the Martin and Park Environmental Demands Questionnaire (MPED), an assessment of busyness. Results revealed that greater busyness was associated with better processing speed, working memory, episodic memory, reasoning, and crystallized knowledge. Hierarchical regressions also showed that, after controlling for age and education, busyness accounted for significant additional variance in all cognitive constructs-especially episodic memory. Finally, an interaction between age and busyness was not present while predicting cognitive performance, suggesting that busyness was similarly beneficial in adults aged 50-89. Although correlational, these data demonstrate that living a busy lifestyle is associated with better cognition.
持续参与具有智力挑战性的活动已被证明可以改善老年人的记忆力。我们假设繁忙的日程安排可以代表一种积极参与的生活方式，并有助于认知。在此，我们研究了50至89岁成年人的忙碌程度与认知之间的关系。来自达拉斯寿命期大脑研究（DLBS）的参与者（N = 330）完成了一套认知测试以及马丁和帕克环境需求问卷（MPED），这是一种对忙碌程度的评估。结果显示，更高的忙碌程度与更好的处理速度、工作记忆、情景记忆、推理和晶体知识相关。分层回归还表明，在控制年龄和教育程度后，忙碌程度在所有认知结构中都占显著的额外方差——尤其是情景记忆。最后，在预测认知表现时，年龄和忙碌程度之间不存在交互作用，这表明忙碌程度在50至89岁的成年人中同样有益。尽管这些数据是相关性的，但它们表明过着忙碌的生活方式与更好的认知相关。
