Most people -; up to 94% of U.S. adults -; experience at least some dulling of their senses with age, finding themselves squinting at screens, craving stronger flavors, and missing snatches of conversations more and more frequently.
Researchers at the University of Chicago Medicine are looking into how these changes can go beyond mere inconvenience and actually worsen overall mental health in older adults. "When your senses decline, you can't experience the world as well," said Jayant Pinto, MD, a physician and expert in olfactory dysfunction at UChicago Medicine. "You can't hear colleagues or friends at the dinner table; you can't discern what's going on in your environment; you may have a hard time reading or making things out when you're in your neighborhood.
It makes all your cognitive burdens a little harder, and that probably wears you down over time and causes mental health problems." Along with Alexander Wang, a medical student at the UChicago Pritzker School of Medicine, Pinto recently led a study examining the prevalence and impact of sensory impairments among older adults. They found that people with sensory disabilities tend to have worse mental health, and that different types of sensory disability were associated with different aspects of mental health.
Revealing associations between perception and emotion The UChicago researchers analyzed data on sensory function (vision, hearing and sense of smell) and self-reported mental health from nearly 4,000 older adults.