Published by: National Institute on Aging
Regular online conversations show potential for helping prevent cognitive decline in socially isolated older adults, according to results from an NIA-funded study published in The Gerontologist.
Social isolation is a risk factor for cognitive decline and dementia. The Internet-based Conversational Clinical Trial (I-CONECT) was led by a team of scientists at Oregon Health & Science University. I-CONECT linked socially isolated older adults with trained conversationalists for regular, 30-minute video chats to stimulate brain function and cognition.
I-CONECT conversations are not just random discussions. Team members are trained to guide participants through conversations specially designed to stimulate brain regions associated with memory, executive function, and abstract thought. The study’s 186 participants were divided into experimental and control groups. The experimental group conversed with trained I-CONECT staff four times weekly for six months, then twice per week for another six months. Control group participants received a weekly, 10-minute phone check-in with I-CONECT staff.
Those receiving the conversational intervention scored an average of 1.75 points higher on cognitive tests than the control group. They also showed higher language-based executive function scores. Measures of emotional well-being improved in both groups. Brain magnetic resonance imaging of participants who had received the intervention showed increased connectivity within the dorsal attention network, a region of the brain associated with working and episodic memory, compared to the control group.
While the study showed promise for the value of stimulating conversations to improve cognitive function in older adults, the original size and scale of this stage of I-CONECT was reduced, in part due to the COVID-19 pandemic. These results suggest a positive result, but they are very preliminary and will require much more extensive testing in different populations and settings.