What if a simple act of kindness could keep your brain healthy?
It might sound too good to be true, but a new study shows that volunteering, or doing unpaid work to help others, could help older people keep their brains sharp.
The Power of Volunteering
Volunteering means spending time helping others, often through charities, religious groups, schools, or health organizations. This can help older adults in a few ways.
It gets them moving and active, gives them a chance to meet and talk with other people, and challenges their brains.
Donna McCullough from the Alzheimer’s Association hopes this new information will encourage more people to volunteer. Not only does volunteering help the community, but it can also boost the brain health of the volunteer.
Despite these benefits, we haven’t known much about how volunteering might help brain function in older people from different backgrounds.
The Study Details
For this study, researchers looked at 2,476 older adults from different races and ethnic backgrounds.
They were part of two large studies, called the Kaiser Healthy Aging and Diverse Life Experiences Study and the Study of Healthy Aging in African Americans.
The average age of people in the study was 74. About half were Black, one-fifth were white, and the rest were Asian or Latino. A little under half of them said they had done some volunteering in the past year.
Researchers found that those who volunteered had better results on brain tests, even after taking into account their age, sex, education, income, and other factors.
The tests measured things like memory and executive function, which includes skills like problem-solving, planning, and paying attention.
Those who volunteered a few times a week had the highest scores on the test that measured executive function.
One of the researchers, Yi Lor, says that volunteering could be a simple way for older adults to protect their brains and reduce their risk of diseases like Alzheimer’s.
Lor and the team plan to look into whether volunteering can help slow down cognitive impairment and how our physical and mental health might affect this.
There was also a hint that people who volunteered might have slower cognitive decline, or slower loss of their brain function. But this finding wasn’t strong enough to be sure.
Conclusion
The main researcher, Rachel Whitmer, reminds us that while we can’t change our age or family history, we do have control over how we spend our day.
Volunteering is a way to keep your brain active. It also helps you connect with others, which can make you feel good and might lower your stress levels.
These results were presented at a big international conference on Alzheimer’s disease held in Amsterdam in 2023.
So, if you’re looking for a way to keep your brain sharp and help out in your community, why not consider volunteering? It might be good for you and for those you’re helping.
If you care about Alzheimer’s disease, please read studies about daytime napping strongly linked to Alzheimer’s disease, and how to treat mild to moderate Alzheimer’s disease.
For more information about brain health, please see recent studies about how Alzheimer’s disease is treated, and results showing alternative drug strategies against Alzheimer’s disease.
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