On 5 November, an international team of researchers published an article on neighbourhood deprivation and midlife cognition in the Alzheimer’s & Dementia journal. The study explored how neighbourhood-level disadvantage may influence cognitive function through modifiable lifestyle risk factors and cerebral small vessel disease (SVD). Data were collected from 585 cognitively healthy adults aged 40–59, combining postcode-based deprivation indices, cognitive assessments, clinical lifestyle risk measures, and 3T MRI scans assessing SVD markers such as white matter hyperintensities and microbleeds.
The authors found that neighbourhood deprivation was associated with poorer cognitive performance which in turn is thought to be linked to and a greater prevalence of modifiable cardiovascular risk factors and a higher SVD burden. Serial mediation indicated that the effects of deprivation on cognition were indirect, with the possibility of operating via lifestyle risk and SVD. The authors note that this explained 20% of the total effect, while SVD alone was able to explain 28%. The results indicate that targeted interventions on lifestyle and vascular health may help mitigate the cognitive impact of socio-environmental disadvantage. The article has been published open access and can be read here: