Dancing Makes You Smarter

It's not a recent study that singles out dancing as the most effective leisure activity to reduce the risk of dementia in the elderly. In fact, it was published in the New England Journal of Medicine more than ten years ago (click here).

Sure, reading and doing crosswords are effective in reducing the risk of dementia in the elderly, but not as much as frequent dancing.

No other physical leisure activity - such as golf, swimming, bicycling - does have any effect whatsoever in this respect.

That's the bottom line of a 21-year study of 469 subjects aged 75 or older conducted by the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York City. There is an excellent synopsis of the study - with reflections added - on the website of Stanford University's Dance Division. It is authored by Richard Powers.


https://socialdance.stanford.edu/syllabi/smarter.htm

Published on 24 March 2015