Brain Drain Hits Us All

This article revolves around research that is contradictory to previous research on mental decline, those with brain issues such as dementia or Alzheimer’s.

The original research indicated that higher levels of education was an indicator of a person’s ability to withstand the debilitating effects of dementia. The more intelligent you were and the more you engaged in learning new things, keeping your brain active, the less likely you were to suffer from brain dysfunction.

This new study indicates that higher learning might give you a better memory but that it does not slow down the rate of its decline.

This new research comes from the University College of London where they attempted to measure the cognitive ability of 11,000 persons aged 65 and older from 10 different countries, mainly European. This study was done overran 8-year period.

The results indicated that those with higher education had better memory but that over that same 8 year period the rate of decline of brain function was the same for all people.

You have to ask: what can I do to keep my brain function from rapid decline?

There are many factors which include: eating good food, exercising, engaging in social activity, stress reduction, taking the correct vitamins and minerals, restful sleep and so on. One of the most important factors is to engage in activities that induce emotional response, such as: listening to music that stirs memories, going back over old photographs to reconnect with past happy experiences, telling stories about the past. All of these activities are primarily targeting getting back in touch with emotions, because brain decline diseases result in our mina hormone regulator, the hippocampus, and its’ function being cut off, changed or reduced in some way. The hippocampus regulates our emotional state.