So now it seems that a little light weight training twice a week might help us remember where we put the car keys. Gretchen Reynolds reports in the NYT's Well column that scientists from the Aging, Mobility and Cognitive Neuroscience Laboratory at the University of British Columbia have shown that light weight training changes how well older women think and how blood flows within their brains. Reynolds reports that after 12 months of lifting weights twice a week, women performed significantly better on tests of mental processing ability than a control group of women who completed a balance and toning program, while functional M.R.I. scans showed that portions of the brain that control such thinking were considerably more active in the weight trainers. Teresa Liu-Ambrose, an assistant professor at the university and study leader, tells the Times that weight training does appear to stave off cognitive decline, even late in life.
Read more from Gretchen Reynolds.
Read an abstract of the study here.
I hope it works for men too. My wife and I, 63 and 64, have been doing weight training twice a week for that last 3 years. We recently bumped it up to 3 times. Now where are may keys?
It’s really interesting article, but I completely disagree with this as I did’t relationship between weight loose and memories. Thanks for sharing articles with us.. keep sharing.
Start lifting Charles! It’ll help you remember to add the n you forgot in didn’t!
If nothing else, light weight training (bar bells), helps us maintain what upper body strength we have left if not improve it. So start doing it!!
Thank god—-something beneficial from the more frequent urination that also attends old age in males!