Having a job that is not mentally stimulating is linked to a significantly increased risk of developing dementia, researchers report today.
Researchers writing in The BMJ believe that it could be because mental stimulation is linked to lower levels of certain proteins that may prevent axonogenesis and synaptogenesis.
An international team of researchers examined the association between cognitively stimulating work and subsequent risk of dementia, focusing on three associations: cognitive stimulation and dementia risk; cognitive stimulation and proteins; and proteins and dementia risk.
They analysed studies from the UK, Europe, and the USA and analysed results from seven studies from the IPD-Work consortium, involving 107,896 participants, for cognitive stimulation and dementia risk; 2,261 participants from one study for the second analysis, and two studies involving 13,656 for proteins and dementia risk.
Cognitive stimulation at work was measured at the start of the study and participants were tracked for an average of 17 years.
After adjusting for potentially influential factors, the risk of dementia was found to be lower for participants with high cognitive stimulation at work, with an incidence of 4.8 per 10,000 person years in the high stimulation group and 7.3 in the low stimulation group.
There was no difference between men and women or age groups, but the researchers say the association was stronger for Alzheimer’s disease than for other dementias.
Although this was an observational study, they say this was a large, well designed study that used different types of analyses to provide a certain degree of validation for the main findings that people with cognitively stimulating jobs have a lower risk of dementia in old age than those with non-stimulating jobs.
“The findings that cognitive stimulation is associated with lower levels of plasma proteins that potentially inhibit axonogenesis and synaptogenesis and increase the risk of dementia might provide clues to underlying biological mechanisms,” they conclude.
Kivimäki M, Walker KA, Pentti J et al. Cognitive stimulation in the workplace, plasma proteins, and risk of dementia: three analyses of population cohort studies. BMJ 19 August 2021
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