Helping others shown to slow cognitive decline

Regular volunteering or helping others outside the home can reduce the rate of cognitive aging by 15-20%.

University of Texas at Austin

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In the latest evidence that meaningful social connections bolster health, a team from The University of Texas at Austin and University of Massachusetts Boston has found that regular time spent helping outside the home significantly slows cognitive decline in middle-age and older adults.

The new study of more than 30,000 adults in the U.S. looking at individuals over two decades found that the rate of cognitive decline associated with aging fell by 15%-20% for people who formally volunteer their services or who help in more informal ways with neighbors, family or friends outside the home on a regular basis. This cognitive benefit was consistently observed when individuals devoted about two to four hours per week to helping others. The results were reported in the latest edition of the journal Social Science & Medicine and were based on a study funded by the National Institute on Aging at the National Institutes of Health and the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development. 

“Everyday acts of support — whether organized or personal — can have lasting cognitive impact,” said Sae Hwang Han, an assistant professor of human development and family sciences at UT who led the study. “What stood out to me was that the cognitive benefits of helping others weren’t just short-term boosts but cumulative over time with sustained engagement, and these benefits were evident for both formal volunteering and informal helping. And in addition to that, moderate engagement of just two to four hours was consistently linked to robust benefits.”

The study is one of the first to look simultaneously at the impact of volunteering in the formal sense and more informal types of helping, such as assisting neighbors, relatives or friends in need with things like getting to a health appointment, caring for children, lawn work or preparing taxes. While about 1 in 3 older Americans are reported to engage in scheduled or formal volunteering, more than half manage to help other people in their lives regularly in this more informal way.

“Informal helping is sometimes assumed to offer fewer health benefits due to its lack of social recognition,” Han said. But in fact, “It was a pleasant surprise to find that it provides cognitive benefits comparable to formal volunteering.”

The researchers used longitudinal data from the national Health and Retirement Study, examining results from a representative sample of U.S. residents over the age of 51 dating back to 1998. The new study, which controlled for other contributing factors in volunteerism and helping behaviors such as wealth, physical and mental health, and education, found that age-related cognitive decline slowed as people began and sustained helping behaviors. That data suggests that greater gains may be expected in people who make helping behaviors a part of their routine, year over year.

“Conversely, our data show that completely withdrawing from helping is associated with worse cognitive function,” Han said. “This suggests the importance of keeping older adults engaged in some form of helping for as long as possible, with appropriate supports and accommodations in place.”

The paper offers the latest case for bringing a public health lens to discussions about volunteerism, helping and strengthening neighborhood relations, particularly in later life when diseases associated with cognitive decline and impairment, like Alzheimer’s, tend to set in.

Another recent study, also led by Han, found that volunteering buffered the adverse effects of chronic stress on systemic inflammation — a known biological pathway linked to cognitive decline and dementia. The effect was especially pronounced among people with higher levels of inflammation.

Together, the two studies’ findings suggest that helping behaviors can help boost brain health, whether by reducing the physiological wear and tear associated with stress or by fortifying social connections that bring psychological, emotional and cognitive benefits of their own. In the context of an aging society and increasing concerns about loneliness and isolation, the findings also provide an important basis for continuing to involve people in opportunities to help, even once cognitive decline has set in.

“Many older adults in suboptimal health often continue to make valuable contributions to those around them,” Han said, “and they also may be the ones to especially benefit from being provided with opportunities to help.”

Other authors on the study were former UT postdoctoral researcher Shiyang Zhang and Jeffrey Burr of the University of Massachusetts Boston.

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Journal

Social Science & Medicine

DOI

10.1016/j.socscimed.2025.118465 

Method of Research

Meta-analysis

Subject of Research

People

Article Title

Helping behaviors and cognitive function in later life: The impact of dynamic role transitions and dose changes

Article Publication Date

8-Aug-2025

 DEFUND THE POLICE

Youth violence prevention program shown to reduce arrests by up to 75%

Development of a “violence prevention infrastructure” led to sharp declines in arrests for murder, assault and other youth crimes in Denver

University of Colorado at Boulder

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A CU Boulder-led initiative to reduce youth violence in hard-hit Denver neighborhoods was associated with a 75% decline in arrests for murder, assault, robbery and other youth crimes in recent years, new research shows.

“We now have concrete data to show that when communities come together and mobilize, we can prevent youth violence, even in urban settings with a very high burden,” said senior author Beverly Kingston, director of CU’s Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence (CSPV). 

The study, published in the American Journal of Criminal Justice, assesses the efficacy of the Youth Violence Prevention Center - Denver (YVPC-Denver), one of five university-community partnerships established by the Centers for Disease Control after the 1999 Columbine High School shooting. 

The centers have remained one of the only long-term federally funded efforts to address what the agency has termed the “serious public health issue” of youth violence. 

Homicide is the third leading cause of death for youth ages 10 to 24 and the leading cause of death among Black youth, according to the CDC.

A ‘violence prevention infrastructure’ 

In 2011, YVPC-Denver began working with community organizations in the Montbello and Park Hill neighborhoods of Denver to get at the root cause of youth violence plaguing the neighborhoods and come up with and implement solutions. They used a framework called Communities That Care which hinges on two things: science-backed interventions and community involvement.

“It’s all about building a violence prevention infrastructure,” said Kingston. “Just like we have roads and bridges that we put money toward, we need to build an infrastructure that supports violence prevention throughout the life-course.”

In partnership with elementary schools, after-school programs, and faith and sports organizations, the program provided more than 3,000 youth ages 6 to 18 with training on how to handle anger and peacefully resolve conflict.  

The initiative also worked with pediatricians to develop screenings for kids and get them help if they seemed at high risk of committing violence, and provided mini grants to local groups matching positive adult role models with teens.

Perhaps the most visible outgrowth of the program has been the Power of One Campaign, a sweeping youth-led effort in which dozens of youth, known as the Game Changers, use social media, podcasts, neighborhood block parties and more to send a message to their peers that violence is not normal.

One group of Game Changers produced a documentary film “Breaking the Cycle: Stories of Strength and  Survival of Gun Violence.” 

Others recently rolled out an app which connects youth with peers for help handling food insecurity, mental health issues or gang violence. 

“Sometimes the people who are causing the violence are just youth having trouble at home and having a hard time getting the help they need,” said Game Changer Annecya Lawson, who joined the program after a friend was fatally shot her sophomore year in high school. “When these kids see somebody their age, who looks like them, doing stuff for the community, it can have a big impact. They’re more likely to think before they act.”

Crunching the numbers

For the study, CU Boulder researchers analyzed arrest data from the Denver Police Department for the five years prior (2012 – 2016) and five years after (2017 — 2021) Communities that Care was implemented in Park Hill.

They found that arrests fell 75%—from 1,086 per 100,000 people in 2016 to 276 per 100,000 in 2021. Further statistical analyses found that similar communities across the Denver area did not see declines as sharp during the study period. (Collectively, across 74 Denver neighborhoods, youth arrests fell 18% on average).

Montbello, which had implemented Communities that Care several years before Park Hill, maintained stable, lower arrest rates throughout the study period even as they climbed sharply elsewhere amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

This suggests that the infrastructure set up by the program had lasting impacts, said Kingston.

Kingston recently got word that the final year of funding for their current five-year grant cycle is at significant risk of being revoked. Loss of the $1.2 million would jeopardize the existence of the Game Changers and make it impossible for the YVPC – Denver to continue its work.

“Losing this funding would be devastating,” said Kingston. “Not just for Denver but for communities nationwide looking to replicate this success.”

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Journal

American Journal of Criminal Justice

DOI

10.1007/s12103-025-09811-0 

Method of Research

Observational study

Subject of Research

People

Article Title

Effects of the Communities that Care (CTC) Prevention System on Youth Violence Outcomes in Two Violence-Impacted Denver Communities

ADHD medication linked to reduced risk of suicide, drug abuse, transport accidents and criminal behaviour

Findings should help inform clinical practice and the debate on ADHD drug treatment

BMJ Group

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Drug treatment for people with newly diagnosed attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is associated with significantly reduced risks of suicidal behaviours, substance misuse, transport accidents, and criminality, finds a study published by The BMJ today. 

The researchers say this is the first study of its kind to show beneficial effects of ADHD drug treatment on broader clinical outcomes for all ADHD patients and should help inform clinical practice.

ADHD affects around 5% of children and 2.5% of adults worldwide and is associated with adverse outcomes including suicidal behaviours, substance misuse, accidental injuries, transport accidents and criminality.

Although randomised trials have shown that ADHD medication alleviates core symptoms, evidence of its effects on these broader clinical outcomes are more limited.

To address this knowledge gap, researchers drew on data from Swedish national registers (2007-2020) to examine the effects of ADHD drug treatment in 148,581 individuals aged 6-64 years with a new diagnosis of ADHD.

Using a technique called target trial emulation, which applies the design principles of randomised trials to observational data, they assessed first and recurrent events for five outcomes (suicidal behaviours, substance misuse, accidental injuries, transport accidents, and criminality) over two years after diagnosis.

Of the 148,581 individuals with ADHD (average age 17 years; 41% female), 84,282 (57%) started drug treatment for ADHD, with methylphenidate being the most commonly prescribed (88.4%).

After accounting for factors including age, sex, education level, psychiatric diagnoses and medical history, ADHD medication was associated with reduced rates of a first occurrence of four of the five outcomes: a 17% reduction for suicidal behaviour, 15% for substance misuse, 12% for transport accidents, and 13% for criminality.

The reduction was not statistically significant for a first-time accidental injury (88.5 v 90 per 1000 person years).

However, amongst people with recurrent events, the rate reductions associated with ADHD medication were seen for all five outcomes: a 15% reduction for suicidal attempts, 25% for substance misuse, 4% for accidental injuries, 16% for transport accidents, and 25% for criminality.

Possible explanations include reduced impulsivity, which might lower criminality by curbing aggressive behaviour, and enhanced attention, which might decrease the risk of transport accidents by minimising distractions, suggest the authors.

They acknowledge several limitations, such as being unable to assess data on non-drug treatments or the impact of drug dosage. And while target trial emulation is one of the most rigorous approaches for analysing observational data, they can’t rule out the possibility that other factors, such as ADHD severity, genetic predispositions, and lifestyle factors, may have affected their results, so no definitive causal conclusions can be drawn.

However, this was a large study based on national registry data and findings were similar after further sensitivity analyses, suggesting they are relevant to people with ADHD in real-world clinical settings.

As such, they conclude: “These results provide evidence on the effects of ADHD drug treatment on important health related and social outcomes that should inform clinical practice and the debate on the drug treatment of ADHD.”

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Journal

BMJ

DOI

10.1136/bmj-2024-083658 

Method of Research

Observational study

Subject of Research

People

Article Title

ADHD drug treatment and risk of suicidal behaviours, substance misuse, accidental injuries, transport accidents, and criminality: emulation of target trials

Article Publication Date

13-Aug-2025

COI Statement

All authors have completed the ICMJE uniform disclosure form at https://www.icmje.org/disclosure-of-interest/ and declare: support from the Swedish Research Council for Health, Working Life and Welfare; the Swedish Research Council, ìShizu Matsumuraîs Donation, KI Research Grants, the Swedish Heart-Lung Foundation, the Söderström König Foundation, Fredrik och Ingrid Thurings Stiftelse, the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, the National Institute for Health and the Care Research, and the European Research Executive Agency; HL has received grants from Shire Pharmaceuticals, personal fees from, and has served as a speaker for, Medici, Shire/Takeda Pharmaceuticals, and Evolan Pharma AB, and sponsorship for a conference on ADHD from Shire/ Takeda Pharmaceuticals and Evolan Pharma AB, all outside the submitted work; SC has received reimbursement for travel and accommodation expenses from the Association for Child and Adolescent Mental Health (ACAMH) in relation to lectures delivered for ACAMH, the Canadian ADHD Alliance Resource, the British Association of Psychopharmacology, and the Healthcare Convention and CCM Group team for educational activity on ADHD; SC has also received honorariums from Medice and serves as chair of the European ADHD Guidelines Group, all outside the submitted work; ZC has received speaker fees from Takeda Pharmaceuticals, outside the submitted work; no other relationships or activities that could appear to have influenced the submitted work.

Gerrymandering erodes confidence in democracy

UCR-led study draws from surveys of nearly 30,000 US voters

University of California - Riverside

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When politicians redraw congressional district maps to favor their party, they may secure short-term victories. But those wins can come at a steep price — a loss of public faith in elections and, ultimately, in democracy itself.

That’s the conclusion of a peer-reviewed study led by UC Riverside political scientist Shaun Bowler, published in Political Research Quarterly. The research finds that partisan gerrymandering — the manipulation of district boundaries to lock in political advantage — does more than distort representation in Congress. It undermines the belief that elections are fair, a cornerstone of democratic legitimacy.

Bowler, a professor of political science, said survey data from tens of thousands of voters in the 2020 and 2022 elections show that Americans view gerrymandering with the same disdain they reserve for bribery and other blatant forms of political corruption. The difference, he said, is that gerrymandering is carried out in full public view, cloaked in arguable legality.

Consider the current push in Texas, where Republican legislators and Gov. Greg Abbott, encouraged by President Donald Trump, are working to redraw congressional districts to add five GOP seats as part a Republican effort to retain control of Congress after next year’s midterm election.

“It’s out in the open,” Bowler said. “They’re saying, ‘We’re rigging the midterm election to produce an outcome.’”

Even for voters whose party benefits, such victories can feel hollow.

 “Voters think, ‘What did we win? These people were elected by a rigged outcome, and now they’re going to tell me what’s good for the community?’” Bowler said. 

When people believe elections are predetermined by politicians, rather than decided by voters, they may be less inclined to donate to candidates, volunteer, or even show up at the polls. 

Bowler’s findings suggest the disillusionment crosses party lines. 

“Even if you’re a Republican in Texas, you know cheating went on,” he said. “If the referee is always on your side, did you really win the game? When a representative wins this way, it is like being a sports figure whose stats always have an asterisk by their name to convey that there will always be doubts about them.”

This erosion of legitimacy can ripple far beyond Election Day. “If they didn’t win fair and square, why should I believe what they say? Why should I pay my taxes? You get an erosion of civic behavior,” Bowler said.

The study also connects gerrymandering to broader perceptions of corruption. While bribery is often the image that comes to mind, Bowler calls self-serving map drawing a form of “improper benefit” that voters also instinctively see as wrong. In states with histories of political scandal, the association is even stronger. 

Bowler and co-author Todd Donovan of Western Washington University in Bellingham examined how state-level conditions influence trust in elections. They used the Survey on the Performance of American Elections (SPAE), conducted by the MIT Election Data and Science Lab, which asks voters how confident they are that votes were counted as intended in their state and nationwide.

The study zeroed in on confidence in state vote counts since election administration quality and other election processes are measured at the state level. The 2020 SPAE surveyed 18,200 registered voters, with at least 200 from every state and the District of Columbia, and larger samples in 10 states. The 2022 survey included 10,200 voters, with similar sampling. Both were conducted by YouGov and weighted to reflect the national voting population.

Researchers linked these responses to the MIT Elections Performance Index, which scores states on ballot rejection rates, post-election audits, online voter tools, and othermeasures. They also considered corruption, measured by U.S. Department of Justice conviction rates for public officials from 2011 to 2020.

Partisan gerrymandering was measured using the “Efficiency Gap” to show how much maps favor one party. It compares each party’s “wasted votes” (votes that don’t help win a seat, either because they are cast for a losing candidate or are excess votes beyond what was needed to win) across all districts in a state. If one party consistently wastes far fewer votes than the other, the map boundaries are giving it a systematic advantage. The larger the gap, the greater the partisan bias baked into the district lines.

The study — “Corruption, gerrymandering and perceptions of election integrity: Is there more than confidence than partisanship? — also accounted for state party control, whether a state was a late-counting swing state in 2020, voters’ partisanship, demographics, and, when available, perceptions of election officials’ fairness.

Using multilevel statistical models, the researchers found that state-level conditions shape not only confidence in a state’s own vote counts but also perceptions of national results.

Independent redistricting commissions offer one way to rebuild trust, Bowler said. California’s voter-approved commission has earned praise for removing the process from the hands of lawmakers. Another option is proportional representation, in which parties win seats based on their share of the statewide vote, rather than in winner-take-all districts, Bowler said. While no system can fully remove politics from redistricting, Bowler argues that these reforms could weaken the perception that lines are secretly drawn to favor insiders.

“Democracy depends not only on fair rules,” he said, “but also on the belief that those rules are fair.”

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Journal

Political Research Quarterly

DOI

10.1177/1532673X251352552 

Article Title

Corruption, Gerrymandering and Perceptions of Election Integrity: Is There More to Confidence Than Partisanship?

 

Study reveals rich but vulnerable picture of Australia's island frogs and fish

University of Queensland

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image: 

The striped rocketfrog (Litoria nasuta) is widely distributed both on the Australian mainland and on the country's islands.

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Credit: Samuel Ho

A first database has been compiled of the frog and freshwater fish species on hundreds of Australian islands.

It was developed at The University of Queensland to help target conservation efforts across Australia’s 9,300 islands using information from multiple sources, including the Atlas of Living Australia platform and thousands of published wildlife surveys.

Researcher Samuel Ho from UQ’s School of the Environment said the study found that 536 Australian islands had freshwater habitats, ranging from deep lakes to wetlands and seasonal creeks.

“Across those islands, there are 102 amphibian species from 6 different families with a wide range of sizes and behaviours,” Mr Ho said.

“We recorded 95 freshwater fish species, some of which are endemic to a particular island along with 9 non-native species.”

The project looked at the environmental factors that influence the presence of frog and fish species on islands, their threat levels and risk of extinction.

“Frogs were more common on islands close to the mainland with humid climates and low temperature variability while the number of freshwater fish species was higher on larger islands,” Mr Ho said.

“Within the database, 14 of the recorded species are known to be threatened, most of them freshwater fish.

“While only 2.5 per cent of the Earth’s surface water is freshwater, these habitats are highly biodiverse.

“Freshwater ecosystems on islands are particularly vulnerable to human-induced threats such as habitat destruction and rapid climate change, and they are often understudied.

“We hope this database will help prioritise conservation efforts and pinpoint Australian islands that need more comprehensive surveys.” 

The project is part of a wider long-term study of Australia’s islands and their conservation by UQ’s Biodiversity Research Group, led by Professor Salit Kark.

Professor Kark said the research team had developed a database of threatened plant and animal species for all of Australia’s 9,300 islands.

“Islands are hotspots for species that do not occur anywhere else on Earth,” she said.

“But a combination of their isolation and human activity can lead to species becoming threatened on islands and indeed many extinctions have occurred on islands globally.

“This new database helps us better understand the patterns and processes at play on islands to help direct future conservation and management actions for these valuable and sensitive ecosystems, including highly threatened groups such as amphibians and freshwater fish.

“We hope the database will be used by local island communities, managers, researchers and other organisations to support island communities and biodiversity.”

The Australian islands amphibian and freshwater fish database is open access.

The research has been published in Diversity and Distributions.

 

The ornate burrowing frog (Platyplectrum ornatum) is one of the most frequently occurring amphibian species on Australian islands. It can burrow beneath the surface and may remain dormant underground during the day or throughout dry seasons, enabling it to survive on drier islands.

 

The ornate rainbowfish (Rhadinocentrus ornatus) is a Vulnerable species found only in parts of eastern Australia, including offshore islands such as North Stradbroke Island (Minjerribah). They are highly variable in colouration, ranging from pale silvery tones to vibrant blue and red, depending on the population and environment.

Credit

Samuel Ho

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DOI

10.1111/ddi.70062 

Method of Research

Data/statistical analysis

Subject of Research

Animals

Article Title

Diversity and Distribution of Amphibians and Freshwater Fishes on Australian Islands