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Cognitive decline can be slowed down with lifestyle changes

smithsonianmag.com

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Re: Cognitive decline can be slowed down with lifestyle changes

#61

Post by SketchySeaBeast »

icelancer wrote: post #42
apsurd wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How come it's so hard for people to drink water? Honest question. Like why don't you just wake up in the morning, take a whiz, brush your teeth, and drink a glass of water? What gets in between? Because the first two are 99% success rate I'd bet.

Because most people drink to thirst, not out of habit.

But is that bad? Do people actually need to drink more than they are thirsty for? Why is it that our hunger sense is over-tuned, but conventional wisdom says that our hydration sense is under-tuned?

Honestly, I feel like "always be drinking" only appeared once bottled water did.

Re: Cognitive decline can be slowed down with lifestyle changes

#62

Post by ocschwar »

ekianjo wrote: post #53
robinhouston wrote: post #48

> Schott also notes that the clinical trial didn’t include a control group of participants who got no guidance and made no lifestyle changes. This makes it hard for researchers to pinpoint which aspect of the program might have been responsible for the positive effect. However, Heather M. Snyder, senior vice president for medical and scientific relations at the Alzheimer’s Association, tells the New York Times that t…

> neglecting to offer an intervention to one group would be unethical. i read that as "doing Science would be unethical"

There are many contexts where doing an experiment with proper controls is literally a crime against humanity.

Which means, yes, that there are many studies where the control isn't quite proper. And that does slow down progress in medical science.

Re: Cognitive decline can be slowed down with lifestyle changes

#63

Post by hn_acc1 »

bloodyplonker22 wrote: post #26
MaxPock wrote: post #14

I had a successful exit two years ago ,thinking retirement would be bliss,traveling here, exploring hobbies there. But it all became routine and surprisingly boring, faster than I expected. Over time, I started forgetting things, which really unsettled me. I became increasingly lazy and unmotivated. Earlier this year,I began volunteering as a systems administrator and network engineer for an NGO and I couldn’t be hap…

I don't mean to be negative, but things become boring fast when you have no hobbies and interests outside of work. You were likely programmed to do work -- so much that it became your only hobby.

The sad thing is - especially in software/tech - it's so competitive these days, if you don't "live to work", you won't work enough to live..

As a 30+ year software dev, the expectations / requirements are definitely more challenging than when I started. Mind you, the tools are also somewhat better, but there's this feeling of needing to be always-on that's hard to shake.

And the whole "take as many days as you need" fake-unlimited-vacation thing, where people end up taking less vacation days than before because it feels "wrong" to actually take 4-5 weeks vacation in a year when others aren't taking as much. At my previous employer, when I joined, it was start at 18 vacation days per year, add one for every year at the company up to 28 - and you could bank up to ~35 before you lost days. At least you felt "entitled" to take those days. Then, they switched to "flexible PTO" and I'm sure overall, people took less days vacation. My current employer is "flexible" and I feel anxious taking 4 weeks throughout the year.

Re: Cognitive decline can be slowed down with lifestyle changes

#64

Post by hn_acc1 »

spidersenses wrote: post #33
luckydata wrote: post #2

How many times do we need to hear "exercise and healthy eating" prolong life and improve cognitive function?

The more important question appears to be why it seems to difficult to follow the advice? Personally, I'm well aware of the positive effects of drinking plenty of water, eating vegetables, exercising daily, and going to bed early. However, I buy myself a chocolate bar every day, love pizza, just want to unwind after a hard day at work, and still read Reddit late into the night. All the healthy stuff has friction: a w…

It's probably easier to monetize chocolate bars, pizza and reddit (ads). Easier to slip into "junk" mode and harder to stop.

My exercise equipment is long paid for (10+ years ago), I watch sports while exercising (subscription paid whether I exercise or not) and going to bed early means less need for caffeine / painkillers to get through the day. Veggies are somewhat more expensive, not sure if the margins are as high on them as on ultra-processed food.

And yet, I'm right there with you - I struggle daily with doing the right thing.

Re: Cognitive decline can be slowed down with lifestyle changes

#65

Post by doright »

SketchySeaBeast wrote: post #25
mvieira38 wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you stop using your phone for anything other than communicating (yes, not just the loose "stop doomscrolling" advice) a lot of these will come naturally. It will lead you to using a real alarm clock and not using your phone after going to bed, which will make your sleep schedule that much more consistent, and also improve quality of sleep. These will probably give you more motivation, which you'll need because the…

> These will probably give you more motivation, which you'll need because the time you used to waste on the phone now needs to be occupied by a real hobby, and here comes language learning, chess, music, etc. Man, that "probably" is doing a ton of heavy lifting.

And the causality is the opposite in my experience. I view my smartphone as a maladaptive way of self-soothing. Locking away my phone just means I'm left with unchecked anxiety I can't think myself out of, and I've only deprived myself of one more method of addressing it (nonoptimally).

People without constant stress have less temptation. In times where my anxiety is the lowest due to sheer circumstance, any reason I have to doomscroll vanishes and I can then occupy my time with a hobby. But it's not because I chose to do away with my phone that I'm able to do so, it's because I didn't have to spend all my time and effort fighting stress. The less stress, the closer the "choice" gets to being a no-brainer, entirely automatic.

Re: Cognitive decline can be slowed down with lifestyle changes

#67

Post by Mars008 »

stefap2 wrote: post #8

Structured lifestyle intervention. Participants attended 38 facilitated peer team meetings over two years and were provided with a prescribed activity program with measurable goals for: - aerobic, resistance and stretching exercise - adherence to the MIND diet, a combination of the Mediterranean diet with the salt restrictions of the DASH diet - cognitive challenge through BrainHQ training and other intellectual and…

Just BrainHQ training alone would likely increase the scores. The rest is general health management.

Re: Cognitive decline can be slowed down with lifestyle changes

#68

Post by bmacho »

mvieira38 wrote: post #22
doppelgunner wrote: post #6

Great, so my brain isn't a doomed potato after all. Just need to sleep, exercise, eat well, socialize, reduce stress, stop doomscrolling, learn a language, play chess, meditate, avoid sugar, limit screen time, and reverse the entropy of the universe. Easy.

If you stop using your phone for anything other than communicating (yes, not just the loose "stop doomscrolling" advice) a lot of these will come naturally. It will lead you to using a real alarm clock and not using your phone after going to bed, which will make your sleep schedule that much more consistent, and also improve quality of sleep. These will probably give you more motivation, which you'll need because the…

> If you stop using your phone for anything other than communicating (yes, not just the loose "stop doomscrolling" advice) a lot of these will come naturally.

People before 2007 slept, exercised, ate well, socialized, reduced stress, learnt a language, played chess, meditated, avoided sugar, limited screen time, and reversed the entropy of the universe.

Re: Cognitive decline can be slowed down with lifestyle changes

#69

Post by jerlam »

hn_acc1 wrote: post #64
spidersenses wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The more important question appears to be why it seems to difficult to follow the advice? Personally, I'm well aware of the positive effects of drinking plenty of water, eating vegetables, exercising daily, and going to bed early. However, I buy myself a chocolate bar every day, love pizza, just want to unwind after a hard day at work, and still read Reddit late into the night. All the healthy stuff has friction: a w…

It's probably easier to monetize chocolate bars, pizza and reddit (ads). Easier to slip into "junk" mode and harder to stop. My exercise equipment is long paid for (10+ years ago), I watch sports while exercising (subscription paid whether I exercise or not) and going to bed early means less need for caffeine / painkillers to get through the day. Veggies are somewhat more expensive, not sure if the margins are as hig…

For the elderly, participating on Reddit would probably be a step up.

Cable news and Tiktok are far worse.

Re: Cognitive decline can be slowed down with lifestyle changes

#70

Post by skirmish »

pessimizer wrote: post #12
luckydata wrote: post #2

How many times do we need to hear "exercise and healthy eating" prolong life and improve cognitive function?

It's the signal that they have no idea what they're talking about. Always remember everything doctors said people should do to cure their stomach ulcers: the "why not?" list. "Your medical team has carefully gone over the results of your tests, and we've finally come to the careful consensus that you should keep active, drink more water, get enough sleep but not too much, and eat your vegetables." "But..." "Why not?…

"Research says hopping on one foot can burn 600 calories in 30 minutes! Why the look, get going already!"
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