In her talk, Professor Holland will be providing an insight into lifelong learning and cognitive health as we age. You can book a place to join our live broadcast online and see her talk as well as enjoy the whole event.
Of course, we are used to hearing that education creates the building blocks for our lives. Opportunities so often come from the learning, skills and knowledge developed in our education at school and often beyond.
The assumption most people have had is that it increases our potential for satisfying or well-paid jobs. Professor Carol Holland, a psychologist and Director of the Centre for Ageing Research at Lancaster University is looking at how lower and higher early life education may be impacting on our cognitive function, cognitive impairment and dementia risks in our later years.
At our GREAT MINDS LIVE event in Sheffield, Professor Holland will explain a concept called ‘cognitive reserve’ and how intellectual engagement throughout our lives can help to build a resilience or protective factor of high value in our old age. Those attending online and at the venue will also hear about cognitive frailty, which refers to physical frailty and mild cognitive impairment often co-existing. She will explain how there is an important role for a cognitive reserve in mediating this relationship between physical and mental decline.
During her talk she will present some studies conducted during the COVID-19 pandemic which have examined specific impacts of education on aspects of loneliness, social isolation, psychological resilience and technology use.