Staying mentally sharp as long as possible is a hot subject these days, but oddly little is known about how to do it. Recent work, for instance, has shown that yoga and meditation may do more for mental acuity than computer programs that are designed for that very purpose. And now, a new study in Frontiers in Aging Neuroscience finds that people who stay busier as they age may also have better scores on tests of memory and cognition. This may well be true–it makes intuitive sense–but it’s also important to keep in mind that all busyness may not be created equal. In fact, some forms of busyness might be more cognitively valuable to our brains than others.
The team from the University of Texas at Dallas had 330 people aged 59 to 80 take a battery of neuropsychological tests to measure different aspects of their memory and cognition. The participants also answered a number of questions about their perceived busyness level. For instance, questions included, “How busy are you during an average day?” “How often do you have too many things to do each day to actually get them all done?” and “How often do you have so many things to do that you go to bed later than your regular bedtime?”
There were some clear links between the two variables: People who reported being busier had better working memory, better reasoning skills and better vocabulary. There was also a particularly strong link between busyness and episodic memory--remembering events in the past--which most of us value greatly as we age.
Given the fact that many people today feel overbooked (and often stressed from it), the research may bring a more positive new angle to the busyness phenomenon.
But there are some limitations to the study, one being that it’s not actually clear which way the relationship works. That is, does busyness lead to a sharper mind, or does having a sharper mind in the first place lead people to stay busier longer or in different ways? In a similar vein, earlier evidence has shown that people with more education may stave off the symptoms of cognitive decline longer because they have more mental resources. Or it could also be that busy people are more physically active, and the physical activity is what's responsible for the cognitive benefits.
Finally, it’s worth pointing out that the concept of busyness has changed a bit over the years. People who are older, as in the current study, may have a healthier “brand” of busyness than younger people–that is, they may engage in more person-to-person interactions and social events, and in games or new hobbies that involve physical (as opposed to digital) maneuvering. Younger adults, on the other hand, may feel busy for other reasons--from digital overstimulation, like toggling between devices and interacting with friends on social media. It’s not so clear how these types of “busy” affect the brain and well-being over time, but there’s some evidence to suggest that the effects may not be so positive. And the researchers point out that learning seems to be the key component in the busyness-cognition connection, and could underlie the positive effects they observed here.
So more research clearly needs to be done to understand more about what keeps us mentally intact over the years, and how busyness fits in. Staying busy is probably a good thing on average, and may very well help keep us sharp over the years. But it’s important to keep an eye on where our feeling of busyness actually comes from. If it comes from doing work that we love, trying out new hobbies, enrolling in a class and going out with friends regularly, it’s probably all good. But if it comes from too much time on Facebook and overextending ourselves in less healthy (and more stressful) ways, it may be time to switch things up, for the sake of our brains.
