4 ms·

More accurately, middle aged people who get less than 6 hours of sleep a night are 30% more likely to get dementia. I'd expect that people who get less than 6

by fish45 5y ago

More accurately, middle aged people who get less than 6 hours of sleep a night are 30% more likely to get dementia. I'd expect that people who get less than 6 hours of sleep are also more stressed and less health concious though.

CerealFounder 5y ago
This guy infers. This seems like a tough study given the correlation factors.
pmiller2 5y ago
Sure, I'd agree with the "more stressed and less health conscious" bit. But, the article does give some good reasons to suggest that either midlife insomnia is a very early symptom of dementia, or that sleep deprivation itself leads to dementia. Nonetheless, we are talking about people who have pre-existing insomnia before being diagnosed with dementia. According to the Mayo Clinic[0], the most common causes of insomnia are: * Stress. * Disrupted circadian rhythms due to shift work or frequent travel. * Poor sleep habits. * Eating too much late in the day. Further down the list are: * Anxiety disorders. * Medications. * Other medical conditions. * Sleep disorders. * Caffeine, nicotine, and alcohol. * Age (older people sleep less than younger people). Of these, anxiety disorders; sleep disorders; and caffeine, nicotine, and alcohol seem the most interesting to me. Anxiety disorders probably have an effect much like that of chronic stress, except that simple chronic stress generally goes away eventually. Sleep disorders seem interesting because we have some evidence that sleep serves a function related to brain health, but, really, we don't know exactly what sleep does for us. And, alcohol, nicotine, and caffeine are interesting because the former two carry their own, independent health risks. Caffeine is interesting because, of course, it is active in the central nervous system, and it actually shows some limited evidence for a protective effect against Alzheimer's disease. [1] Cross referencing that with the list of things they control for ("age (timescale), sex, ethnicity, education, marital status, alcohol consumption, physical activity, smoking status, fruit and vegetable consumption, BMI, hypertension, diabetes, cardiovascular disease, GHQ depression, and CNS medications"), we can (lightly) cross age, nicotine, and alcohol off the list of interesting things. All this makes me wonder if either insomnia is an early dementia symptom, as they suggest, or if one of the causes of insomnia is the instigating factor. And, it seems to me the most interesting causal factors for insomnia left on the board are anxiety and stress. Oh, and guess what? Anxiety, stress, and PTSD have been independently linked to the development of dementia! [2] To me, that's interesting because anxiety is known to impair both working memory and cognitive processes[3], things which are both impaired in dementia. I don't mean to suggest that anxiety and stress cause dementia all by themselves, but I do think this might point to a more significant role for anxiety and stress than is typically considered these days. Anyway, these are just some idle thoughts from someone who is neither a doctor, neuroscientist, nor biological researcher of any kind. If anyone has anything else to add, or would care to riff off this, I'd love to see it. --- [0]: https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/insomnia/symptoms-causes/syc-20355167 https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/insomnia/symp... [1]: https://content.iospress.com/download/journal-of-alzheimers-disease/jad091387?id=journal-of-alzheimers-disease%2Fjad091387 https://content.iospress.com/download/journal-of-alzheimers-... [2]: https://www.alzheimers.org.uk/blog/there-link-between-stress-and-dementia-risk https://www.alzheimers.org.uk/blog/there-link-between-stress... [3]: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/anxiety-fear-and-hate/201902/how-anxiety-impacts-the-way-we-perceive-and-think https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/anxiety-fear-and-hat...
kazinator 5y ago
That's not more accurately at all; you're still insinuating a causal relationship. "More accurately, people with yellow-stained fingertips are more likely to get lung cancer." The actual study's own title puts it more accurately: "Association of sleep duration in middle and old age with incidence of dementia"
- fish45 5y ago
  I don't think it insinuates a causal relationship. I interpret "30% more likely" as the same as "associated with a 30% increase," which is what the article claims.
  - MauranKilom 5y ago
    I would say that "People who do X are 30% more likely to get X" is commonly understood to imply causation.
    - ziml77 5y ago
      How would you phrase it? Because I did not read that as meaning that less sleep caused dementia.
      - aoeusnth1 5y ago
        "is associated with" is a much more neutral phrasing. The phrasing did not denote causality but does imply it to a casual reader.

by fish45 5y ago

CerealFounder 5y ago

This guy infers. This seems like a tough study given the correlation factors.

pmiller2 5y ago

Sure, I'd agree with the "more stressed and less health conscious" bit. But, the article does give some good reasons to suggest that either midlife insomnia is a very early symptom of dementia, or that sleep deprivation itself leads to dementia. Nonetheless, we are talking about people who have pre-existing insomnia before being diagnosed with dementia. According to the Mayo Clinic[0], the most common causes of insomnia are: * Stress. * Disrupted circadian rhythms due to shift work or frequent travel. * Poor sleep habits. * Eating too much late in the day. Further down the list are: * Anxiety disorders. * Medications. * Other medical conditions. * Sleep disorders. * Caffeine, nicotine, and alcohol. * Age (older people sleep less than younger people). Of these, anxiety disorders; sleep disorders; and caffeine, nicotine, and alcohol seem the most interesting to me. Anxiety disorders probably have an effect much like that of chronic stress, except that simple chronic stress generally goes away eventually. Sleep disorders seem interesting because we have some evidence that sleep serves a function related to brain health, but, really, we don't know exactly what sleep does for us. And, alcohol, nicotine, and caffeine are interesting because the former two carry their own, independent health risks. Caffeine is interesting because, of course, it is active in the central nervous system, and it actually shows some limited evidence for a protective effect against Alzheimer's disease. [1] Cross referencing that with the list of things they control for ("age (timescale), sex, ethnicity, education, marital status, alcohol consumption, physical activity, smoking status, fruit and vegetable consumption, BMI, hypertension, diabetes, cardiovascular disease, GHQ depression, and CNS medications"), we can (lightly) cross age, nicotine, and alcohol off the list of interesting things. All this makes me wonder if either insomnia is an early dementia symptom, as they suggest, or if one of the causes of insomnia is the instigating factor. And, it seems to me the most interesting causal factors for insomnia left on the board are anxiety and stress. Oh, and guess what? Anxiety, stress, and PTSD have been independently linked to the development of dementia! [2] To me, that's interesting because anxiety is known to impair both working memory and cognitive processes[3], things which are both impaired in dementia. I don't mean to suggest that anxiety and stress cause dementia all by themselves, but I do think this might point to a more significant role for anxiety and stress than is typically considered these days. Anyway, these are just some idle thoughts from someone who is neither a doctor, neuroscientist, nor biological researcher of any kind. If anyone has anything else to add, or would care to riff off this, I'd love to see it. --- [0]: https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/insomnia/symptoms-causes/syc-20355167 https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/insomnia/symp... [1]: https://content.iospress.com/download/journal-of-alzheimers-disease/jad091387?id=journal-of-alzheimers-disease%2Fjad091387 https://content.iospress.com/download/journal-of-alzheimers-... [2]: https://www.alzheimers.org.uk/blog/there-link-between-stress-and-dementia-risk https://www.alzheimers.org.uk/blog/there-link-between-stress... [3]: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/anxiety-fear-and-hate/201902/how-anxiety-impacts-the-way-we-perceive-and-think https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/anxiety-fear-and-hat...

kazinator 5y ago

That's not more accurately at all; you're still insinuating a causal relationship. "More accurately, people with yellow-stained fingertips are more likely to get lung cancer." The actual study's own title puts it more accurately: "Association of sleep duration in middle and old age with incidence of dementia"

fish45 5y ago
I don't think it insinuates a causal relationship. I interpret "30% more likely" as the same as "associated with a 30% increase," which is what the article claims.
- MauranKilom 5y ago
  I would say that "People who do X are 30% more likely to get X" is commonly understood to imply causation.
  - ziml77 5y ago
    How would you phrase it? Because I did not read that as meaning that less sleep caused dementia.
    - aoeusnth1 5y ago
      "is associated with" is a much more neutral phrasing. The phrasing did not denote causality but does imply it to a casual reader.