A recent study has discovered that older adults living alone may experience slower rates of cognitive decline by owning a pet, potentially counteracting the established link between solitary living—a recognized risk factor for dementia—and cognitive deterioration.
READ: “Taylor Swift Drops ‘1989 (Taylor’s Version)’: What’s Inside the New Album Will Shock You!
The prevalence of individuals living alone has risen in recent decades, reaching 28.5% in the US, 29.4% in the UK, and 25.6% in Australia in 2021. A meta-analysis has highlighted social isolation as a significant dementia risk for older adults, surpassing risks associated with physical inactivity, hypertension, diabetes, and obesity. Pet ownership, as a factor that mitigates social isolation, has been examined for its impact on cognitive decline.
Cognitive decline
While there is limited and debated evidence regarding the connection between pet ownership and cognitive decline rates, a study from China’s Sun Yat-sen University investigated this association specifically in older adults living alone and its potential mitigating effect.
The researchers utilized data from the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing (ELSA), a nationally representative cohort of UK adults aged 50 and above. Surveying 7,945 participants with a mean age of 66.3 (56% women), the study focused on verbal memory and verbal fluency as indicators of cognitive function.
Verbal memory involves the recall of spoken or written information from past conversations or experiences, while verbal fluency gauges the ease with which individuals generate words—an indicator of memory retrieval and executive brain function.
After adjusting for potential variables, the study found that pet owners experienced a slower decline in verbal memory and fluency compared to non-pet owners. Notably, older adults living alone exhibited a faster decline in these cognitive aspects, as did non-pet owners living alone compared to pet owners residing with others.
The researchers suggested that pet ownership might entirely offset the accelerated decline in verbal memory and fluency associated with living alone among older adults. However, they acknowledged limitations, such as the study’s focus on specific cognitive dimensions and the absence of information on the duration of pet ownership. The predominantly white participant sample in the ELSA study also limits generalizability to other racial and ethnic groups.
Given the observational nature of the study, the researchers emphasized the need for further investigations, incorporating a comprehensive assessment of cognitive function to explore the broader association between pet ownership and global cognitive decline in individuals living alone.
