A study conducted by Australian researchers has revealed that people who do not engage in complex mental activity over their lifetime have twice the shrinkage in a key part of the brain in old age.
Michael Valenzuela of the school of psychiatry at the University of NSW has revealed that the finding results from an analysis of the brain scans used during the study.
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The results of the study also add strength to the evidence that mental exercises, like puzzles and new languages, stave off ageing diseases.
"We've got strong evidence here that people who use their brains more have less brain shrinkage," the Australian quoted Valenzuela as saying.
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Valenzuela and his colleagues wanted to determine how mental activity delayed the onset of the degenerative brain diseases, such as Huntington's, Alzheimer's and Parkinson's.
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The researchers discovered that, of the 50 subjects, people who had been more mentally active over their lives had a larger hippocampus, an important memory centre in the brain.
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"This is a significant finding because a small hippocampus is a specific risk factor for developing Alzheimer's disease," said Dr. Valenzuela.
Based on his observations, he came to the conclusion that people could prevent themselves from the shrinkage of the hippocampus.
"Our prior research shows the risk for dementia is quite malleable, even into late life," he said.
An article on the study has been published in the journal PLoS ONE.
Source-ANI
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