Stress can undo the benefits of a healthy lifestyle when it comes to protection against dementia.
Stress has a significant impact on brain decline
A good education and stimulating job can establish a "cognitive reserve" that wards off brain decline but high levels of stress can negate these benefits.
Experts in Sweden were aiming to discover why "some people cope better than others" when faced with cognitive decline in old age and suggest that meditation and mindfulness exercises can be another method of preventing the brain condition.
Analysis of 113 patients aged between 47 and 82 at a memory clinic found that high levels of stress "reduce the beneficial influence of high cognitive reserve on cognitive performance".
Manasa Shanta Yerramalla, a researcher at the Karolinska Institute, said: "These results might have clinical implications as an expanding body of research suggests that mindfulness exercises and meditation may reduce cortisol levels and improve cognition.
"Different stress management strategies could be a good complement to existing lifestyle interventions in Alzheimer's prevention."