Learning more than two languages helps prevent dementia in old age, a study suggests.
A team of researchers led by Subarna Alladi at the Nizam Institute of Medical Sciences in India looked at 648 dementia sufferers and found that those who spoke more than two languages ended up with dementia on average four years later than those who spoke just one.
The average age of the patients was 66. The findings were published in the journal Neurology on Wednesday.
Dementia is usually classified into three types: vascular dementia caused by blocked blood vessels, frontal or temporal dementia caused by loss of functions in those parts of the brain, and Alzheimer's disease caused by deteriorating nerves in the brain.
According to the researchers, learning foreign languages helped prevent all three types.
But that does not mean everyone needs to learn more than two languages. Knowing more languages did not lead to an additional drop in chances of suffering from dementia, according to the study. There was no difference between patients who spoke two languages and those who spoke more.
It also did not matter how fluent a patient was in his or her second language. As long as the patient was able to read it, the preventive effect was the same as knowing how to speak the language fluently or badly.
The team said learning languages helps prevent dementia because it stimulates a wider range of nerves in the brain.
