Bidirectional associations between blood pressure and memory decline over 25 years: a 1946 British Birth cohort population‐based study

Description

Sarah-Naomi James studies how blood pressure and memory influence each other over twenty-five years in this 2025 paper. The data come from a British cohort all born in one week of 1946. About 1,922 members gave blood pressure readings and word memory scores at ages forty-three, fifty-three, sixty, and sixty-nine. Cross lagged models tested both directions at once, with childhood cognition, class, education, and medication accounted for. Higher midlife diastolic pressure predicted worse memory later, step after step.

The reverse path appeared only late: better memory at sixty predicted higher pressure at sixty-nine, more strongly in women. One reading of the twist is that memory itself plays a part in how pressure ages. Early life factors softened both links but did not erase them. The study's span is its strength: few data sets watch the same people for a quarter century.

Catalog record

Source: https://europepmc.org/articles/PMC11716577