Less muscle and more body fat may affect how flexible our thinking gets as we become older, and changes in parts of the immune system could be responsible, a new study suggests.
These findings from Iowa State University in the US, could lead to new treatments that help maintain mental flexibility in aging adults with obesity, sedentary lifestyles, or muscle loss that naturally happens with aging.
The study, published in the journal “Brain, Behaviour, and Immunity”, looked at the data from more than 4,000 middle-aged to older UK Biobank participants, both men and women.