Uineken, Maarten (2024) Decline in cognitive function of older adults: The relative effects of lifestyle factors for Europeans aged 50+. Master thesis.
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Abstract
Ageing naturally occurs with a decline of cognitive function, starting with a ‘silent’ phase without visible symptoms. Slowing down this process of cognitive decline is of great interest for a healthy life and wellbeing at older ages. The individual and clustered effects of the modifiable lifestyle factors nutrition, physical activity, alcohol use and smoking behaviour are associated with the rate of cognitive decline. This study analyses the relative importance of the individual and clustered effects of these lifestyle factors on cognitive decline for the population aged 50+ in Europe. The effects of lifestyle factors on cognitive decline are estimated with linear regressions using longitudinal data from the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE) and controlled for the effects of age, gender, number of chronic diseases, marital status, level of education and type of welfare state. Cognitive function is assessed via a 0-30 composite score based on immediate recall, delayed recall and verbal fluency and healthy lifestyle factors on daily fruit and vegetable intake, weekly physical activity, light to moderate alcohol use and non-smoking. The results indicate only a significant individual negative effect of -.41 (CI -0.65 to -0.17) on the Cognitive Function Score from not engaging in physical activity at least once a week. When clustering the effects of lifestyle factors, only engaging in 3 or 4 unhealthy lifestyle behaviours as opposed to 0 has a significant negative effect of -0.53 (CI -0.99 to -0.07) on the Cognitive Function Score. Physical activity is found to have the greatest relative importance for slowing down the process of cognitive decline in early phases over nutrition, alcohol use and smoking behaviour. The combination of healthy lifestyle behaviours has a greater potential for slowing down cognitive decline than focussing on only one or two of these behaviours. Therefore, health policy should stimulate a balanced healthy lifestyle with a central place for regular physical activity.
| Item Type: | Thesis (Master) |
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| Degree programme: | Population Studies |
| Supervisor: | Bister, L. |
| Date Deposited: | 02 Feb 2024 10:29 |
| Last Modified: | 02 Feb 2024 10:29 |
| URI: | https://frw.studenttheses.ub.rug.nl/id/eprint/4448 |
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