{"doi":"10.1093/geronb/gbae050","title":"Social Activities and Risk of Dementia in Community-Dwelling Older People: Gender-Specific Findings From a Prospective Cohort Study","abstract":"OBJECTIVES: This study examines the gender-specific associations between a wide range of social activities and dementia risk. METHODS: A prospective cohort study was conducted involving community-dwelling older Australians (≥70 years) without significant cognitive impairment at enrolment. During the first year of enrolment, we assessed 25 self-reported social activities covering various aspects, including support from relatives and friends, community participation, social interactions with surroundings, and loneliness. Dementia diagnosis followed DSM-IV criteria, adjudicated by an international expert panel. To estimate hazard ratios (HR) and 95% confidence intervals (CI) for associations between social activities and dementia, we performed Cox proportional hazards models, adjusting for age, educational attainment, baseline global cognition, and depressive symptoms. RESULTS: Among 9,936 participants who completed all social activity questionnaires (median [IQR] age: 73.4 [71.6-77.1] years; 47.4% men), dementia was diagnosed in 3.8% of men (n = 181/4,705) and 2.6% of women (n = 138/5,231) over a median 6.4 years (IQR: 5.3-7.6, range: 0.2-10.1) follow-up. Gender-specific relationships emerged: caregiving for a person with illness/disability in women (HR: 0.65, 95% CI: 0.42-0.99), and having ≥9 relatives feeling close to call for help in men (HR: 0.56, 95% CI: 0.33-0.96; reference <9 relatives) were associated with reduced dementia risk. Unexpectedly, in women, having ≥5 friends with whom they felt comfortable discussing private matters were associated with a greater dementia risk (HR: 1.69, 95% CI: 1.10-2.59; reference ≤2 friends). Imputed models further identified that babysitting/childminding was associated with lower dementia risk in men (HR: 0.75, 95% CI: 0.56-0.99). No other social activities showed significant associations with dementia. DISCUSSION: This study provides evidence of social activities influencing dementia risk. Further investigations are required to uncover the mechanisms driving these observed relationships.","journal":"The Journals of Gerontology Series B","year":2024,"id":432896,"datarank":0.40620753016533157,"base_score":2.70805020110221,"endowment":2.70805020110221,"self_citation_contribution":0.40620753016533157,"citation_network_contribution":0.0,"self_endowment_contribution":0.40620753016533157,"citer_contribution":0.0,"corpus_percentile":null,"corpus_rank":null,"citation_count":14,"citer_count":0,"citers_with_citation_signal":0,"citers_with_endowment":0,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":0.8335,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":true,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":"2024-01-01","fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":1235918,"name":"Achamyeleh Birhanu Teshale","orcid":"0000-0002-7572-9993","position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":537492,"name":"Alice Owen","orcid":"0000-0002-4807-6069","position":2,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":332013,"name":"Joanne Ryan","orcid":"0000-0002-7039-6325","position":3,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":264292,"name":"Robyn L. Woods","orcid":"0000-0003-1249-6149","position":4,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":351162,"name":"Suzanne G. Orchard","orcid":"0000-0003-0211-3183","position":5,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1213705,"name":"André Hajek","orcid":"0000-0002-6886-2745","position":6,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":453434,"name":"Thom S. Lysen","orcid":"0000-0002-7593-935X","position":7,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":284810,"name":"Raj C. Shah","orcid":"0000-0001-9706-9730","position":8,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":792045,"name":"Trevor T.‐J. Chong","orcid":"0000-0001-7764-3811","position":9,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":692607,"name":"Kerry M. Sheets","orcid":"0000-0002-3492-2404","position":10,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1237845,"name":"Johanna Joyce","orcid":"0000-0001-7593-2564","position":11,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":104607,"name":"Anne M. Murray","orcid":"0000-0002-2787-8433","position":12,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":686181,"name":"Rosanne Freak‐Poli","orcid":"0000-0003-4072-8699","position":13,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1235917,"name":"Htet Lin Htun","orcid":"0000-0003-2307-0610","position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":121,"raw_metadata":{"citation_network_status":"fetched"},"created_at":"2026-07-19T01:59:39.937122Z","pmid":"38567686","pmcid":null,"fwci":null,"citation_percentile":null,"influential_citations":0,"oa_status":null,"license":null,"views":0,"total_file_size_bytes":0,"version_count":0,"fair_f":null,"fair_a":null,"fair_i":null,"fair_r":null,"fair_zscore":null,"fair_rationale":null,"fair_model":null,"fair_agent_version":null,"fair_fulltext_source":null,"fair_has_llm":null,"fair_computed_at":null,"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"db_accessions":[],"linked_datasets":[],"topics":[]}