A Seemingly Harmless Daily Habit May Signal Increased Risk of Dementia

Frequent daytime naps in older adults have been linked to a higher risk of developing dementia, according to a study published in The Journal of Gerontology: Medical Sciences.

Researchers at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health followed nearly 1,000 adults ages 65 and older who showed no signs of memory or thinking problems when the study began in 2013.

A decade later, researchers found that daily rest habits — like how often they nap, how much they sleep, and whether they fall asleep by accident — were linked to long-term brain health.

A TYPE OF SLEEP ASSOCIATED WITH A DRAMATICALLY REDUCED RISK OF DEMENTIA, PARKINSON’S AND 81 OTHER DISEASES

The study found that participants who nap frequently, defined as most days or every day, had a 48% higher risk of developing dementia than those who rarely or never nap.

PICTURE

Whether naps are intentional also seems to play a role. Older adults who fall asleep unintentionally have a 39% higher risk, while shorter naps are also associated with poorer outcomes.

According to researchers, napping habits offer critical information about long-term brain health that cannot be measured by nighttime sleep quality or duration alone. (iStock)

A nap of 30 minutes or less was associated with a 40% increased risk of dementia, even after researchers adjusted for other health factors. For naps longer than 30 minutes, the association was less pronounced after the researchers took nighttime sleep patterns into account.

The research team pointed out that examining daytime napping habits gives a much clearer picture of overall health than examining nighttime sleep alone.

THIS QUESTION CAN REVEAL WHETHER YOUR BODY IS GETTING THE REST IT NEEDS, STUDY SAYS

“Our study highlights the importance of looking beyond nap duration and considering other nap characteristics, such as how often they nap and whether their naps are intentional,” study authors Adam Spira, Ph.D., a Bloomberg School professor, and Kening Jiang, Ph.D., a postdoctoral researcher, told Fox News Digital.

TO CALL:

“This study provides important longitudinal evidence that frequent, involuntary daytime naps were associated with a higher risk of developing dementia in older adults.”

The results held even after taking into account nighttime sleep duration, daytime sleepiness, and indicators of sleep apnea.

Taking naps lasting 30 minutes or less was associated with a 40% higher risk of dementia, even after adjusting for overall health factors. (iStock)

“Nighttime sleep and daytime napping are closely related,” Spira and Jiang continued. “Daytime napping may compensate for poor nighttime sleep, but it may also reduce the desire to sleep at night, potentially contributing to nighttime sleep disturbances, another important potential risk factor for dementia.”

TEST YOURSELF WITH OUR LATEST LIFESTYLE QUIZ

The researchers emphasized that daytime rest does not necessarily cause brain changes. Rather, changing nap habits could be a warning sign of underlying changes in the brain.

Regions of the brain that help regulate wakefulness may begin to deteriorate in the early stages of dementia, leading to more frequent daytime fatigue, they noted.

CLICK HERE FOR MORE HEALTH STORIES

To check this, the team reanalyzed the data after excluding anyone who developed dementia in the first five years.

The link between frequent and accidental napping and dementia remained equally strong, suggesting that changes in napping habits may appear years before a formal diagnosis.

Falling asleep unintentionally during the day, rather than planning a structured nap, was linked to an increased risk of dementia. (iStock)

The researchers emphasized that this was an observational study with limitations.

“We did not directly intervene in participants’ napping behaviors to examine whether changing these behaviors would affect their dementia risk,” Spira and Jiang told Fox News Digital.

CLICK HERE TO SUBSCRIBE TO OUR HEALTH NEWSLETTER

“Although we do not know whether napping causes dementia, our study results suggest that daytime napping habits may be useful indicators of future dementia risk,” they added.

CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FOX NEWS APP

The findings suggest that daytime napping habits in older adults are worth monitoring, especially when naps become frequent or occur involuntarily, according to the researchers.