14 DAY TRIAL // In a paper published in the latest issue of the journal Neurology, a team of scientists argues that cognitive decline can be accelerated by a host of factors, including high blood pressure, metabolic disorders and obesity.
The discovery has significant implications for public healthcare systems, especially in First World countries such as the United Kingdom and the United States, where obesity is currently spreading like wildfire, PsychCentral reports.
A high body-mass index (BMI) apparently hampers thinking, reasoning and memory, among other cognitive functions. However, experts are currently unsure as to exactly how this happens. An exact causal link has yet to be established.
“More research is needed to [...] take into account how long people have been obese and how long they have had these metabolic risk factors and also to look at cognitive test scores spanning adulthood to give us a better understanding of the link between obesity and cognitive function,” study team member, Archana Singh-Manoux, PhD, explains.