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Education may not affect how fast you will
lose your memory
Newswise — While a higher level of education
may help lower the risk of Alzheimer’s
disease, new research shows that once
educated people start to become forgetful, a
higher level of education does not appear to
protect against how fast they will lose
their memory.
The research is published in the February 3,
2009, print issue of Neurology®, the medical
journal of the American Academy of
Neurology.
In the study, scientists tested the thinking
skills of 6,500 people with an average age
of 72 from the Chicago area with different
levels of education.
The education level of people in the study
ranged from eight years of school or fewer
to 16 or more years of schooling.
Interviews and tests about memory and
thinking functions were given every three
years for an average of 6.5 years.
At the beginning of the study, those with
more education had better memory and
thinking skills than those with less
education.
However, education was not related to how
rapidly these skills declined during the
course of the study.
The study found that results remained the
same regardless of other factors related to
education such as occupation and race and
the effects of practice with the tests.
“This is an interesting and important
finding because scientists have long debated
whether aging and memory loss tend to have a
lesser affect on highly educated people.
"While
education is associated with the memory’s
ability to function at a higher level, we
found no link between higher education and
how fast the memory loses that ability,”
says study author Robert S. Wilson, PhD,
with the Alzheimer's Disease Center at Rush
University Medical Center in Chicago.
The study was supported by the National
Institute on Aging and by the National
Institute of Environmental Health Sciences.
The American Academy of Neurology, an
association of more than 21,000 neurologists
and neuroscience professionals, is dedicated
to promoting the highest quality
patient-centered neurologic care.
A neurologist is a doctor with specialized
training in diagnosing, treating and
managing disorders of the brain and nervous
system such as multiple sclerosis, restless
legs syndrome, Alzheimer’s disease,
narcolepsy, and stroke.
For more information about the American
Academy of Neurology, visit
www.aan.com.
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