Could Oprah and General
Hospital be bad for your brain?
New research suggests that elderly women who watch daytime
soap operas and talk shows are more likely to suffer from
cognitive impairment than women who abstain from such
fare.
Researchers stress that it's not clear if watching these
TV shows leads to weaker brainpower, or vice-versa. And
they say it's possible that another explanation might
be at work.
But there's definitely "something going on with
those two types of television programming," said
study co-author Joshua Fogel, an assistant professor of
behavioral sciences at Brooklyn College of the City University
of New York.
Fogel launched the federally funded study after wondering
how television affects the brains of older women, many
of whom are avid watchers of the tube. Previous studies
had already looked at possible connections between TV
watching and senility, but came up with differing results,
Fogel said.
In the new study, Fogel and a colleague looked at data
from a 1996 study of healthy women in Baltimore aged 70-79.
The researchers asked the women about their favorite
types of TV shows, offering a list of 14 options including
news, soap operas, comedies and game shows, among others.
The women also took tests that measured their memory,
decision-making abilities and other cognitive skills.
Fogel and his colleague looked for patterns linking cognition
abilities and the women's favorite TV shows. Their findings
appear in the March issue of the Southern Medical Journal.
Women who watched talk shows were 7.3 times more likely
to have long-term memory problems, the researchers said,
while those who watched soap operas were 13.5 times more
likely to have problems with attention.
The researchers didn't find any evidence that TV shows
helped improve cognitive abilities in the women
studied, either.
What's going on? The study can't and doesn't answer that
question, Fogel said, leaving it unclear if a preference
for soaps and talk shows is a cause of cognitive difficulties
or a symptom. "One possibility is that people are
unable to watch the other shows because they're too cognitively
stimulating," Fogel said.
One researcher who has studied the effects of television
watching on children said the study suggests that, "viewing
television in a way that reduces active mental engagement
may lead to poorer cognitive outcomes in older people."
Frederick Zimmerman, director of the University of Washington's
Child Health Institute, added that the findings are significant
because the apparent effects of television watching are
quite striking. He said he's also found evidence that
excessive television watching hurts kids' academic and
cognitive development.
But Zimmerman cautioned that "it would be premature
to tell Granny to turn off the soaps on the basis of this
study."
And in his editorial, Albert Einstein College of Medicine
neurologist Dr. Joe Verghese said that, "depending
on the program, television viewing might even have cognitive
benefits. Generations of children have grown up learning
their alphabets, and presumably increasing their cognitive
reserve, from programs such as Sesame Street. Television
viewing may also help reduce chronic stress levels."
Fogel believes the study findings are more than just
a curiosity, however. In fact, he thinks doctors should
take them into account when they evaluate patients.
If an elderly woman says she enjoys watching talk shows
or soap operas, Fogel said, that might be a sign that
she's having cognitive problems and should undergo special
screening.
