Five things you may not have known about the brain ("must miss" system)
If you can walk, but not walk and talk at the same time, you may be suffering from a decline in brain health.
New research has found that the ability to juggle the two tasks begins to decline nearly a decade earlier than previously thought, with researchers saying this struggle could be a warning sign of dementia.
Scientists from Harvard Medical School and Hebrew SeniorLife found that this function declines after age 55 and should be "routinely monitored beginning in middle age"—rather than starting at age 65—to prevent falls and injuries.
"We evaluated a large number of people between the ages of 40 and 64 years, and observed that the ability to walk under normal, quiet conditions remained relatively stable in this age range," lead researcher Zhonggong Zhou said in a press statement.
"However, even in this relatively healthy group, when we asked the participants to walk and perform a mental task at the same time, we were able to see subtle but important changes in walking starting in the middle of the sixth decade of life."
walk and talk at the same time.
A walking woman (Photo: ShutterStock)
Researchers watched 640 subjects from Spain attempt to multitask between May 2018 and July 2020. The study was published last week in The Lancet Healthy Longevity.
"The performance of dual tasks, in the fields of neurology and aging, is an important marker of brain health," explained Zhou.
"The decline associated with walking may indicate, at a much earlier age, when medical interventions should be initiated."
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Researchers have blamed the decline in cognition and memory on the shrinking of the frontal lobe and hippocampus and a slowing of the production of chemical signals in the brain as people age.
Still, Zhou noted that there were some bright spots in the findings.
"We observed some participants over the age of 60 who performed the dual-task test as well as participants who were 50 or even younger. This means that dual-task walking performance does not necessarily decline as we age, and that some people appear to be more resistant to the effects of aging," Zhou said. .
"We hope that our study will spur future research into the discovery of lifestyle and other modifiable factors that support maintenance of dual-task performance into old age, as well as interventions targeting these factors."
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