According To Studies Having Higher Education Can Slow Dementary Effects, Is That True?

Illustration (Leon Wu / Unsplash)

JAKARTA - There is an assumption that higher education can slow down the harmful effects of dementia. However, a study refutes that assumption. Studies in the journal Neurology found that education may not be that important to combat cognitive and dementia declines, as reported by ANTARA from Time.

To get to that conclusion, the researchers involved nearly 3,000 elderly people about eight years of age in the study. They found that obtaining more education did not appear to protect people fromikirizing skills as soon as the cognitive descent process began.

People with higher levels of education at the start of research did show better thinking skills on various tests, but education rates don't seem to affect how quickly people develop after cognitive declines and in some cases dementia begins.

"Education provides some protection against dementia, but does not provide protection against [level] cognitive decline," Robert Wilson, professor of neurological science at Rush University Medical Center.

In the study, researchers also tracked whether the cognitive level of people had decreased varying based on their level of education. They found answers: no.

The findings show that those with higher education have no less signs of physical dementia in the form of lesions, plaques, or tangled neurons in their brains. However, that doesn't mean education doesn't provide any benefit of protecting the aging brain.

Higher education can help build stronger networks of cells, which seem to help protect against cells that deteriorate with aging. But once cognitive decline begins, that advantage appears to be erased.