Older adults who pitch in to help care for their grandkids tend to hang on to their cognitive skills later in life than those who don’t. But it’s not the amount of time spent grandparenting that matters. It’s what they do with that time that appears to stave off cognitive decline.
At least that’s the conclusion of a sweeping new analysis in Psychology and Aging.
“Many grandparents provide regular care for their grandchildren – care that supports families and society more broadly,” lead researcher Flavia Chereches, MS, of Tilburg University in the Netherlands, said in a press release. “An open question, however, is whether caregiving for grandchildren may also benefit grandparents themselves.”
Methodology
The researchers followed more than 1,700 older adults in England for more than half a decade to study how grandchild caregiving relates to memory and verbal ability.
Drawing on three waves of data from the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing (ELSA), the authors discovered that caregiving grandparents generally performed better on tests of episodic memory and verbal fluency than comparable non-caregivers. But the benefits were hardly consistent. And they appeared to be surprisingly independent of the time spent providing care.
The strongest and most consistent gains appeared among grandmothers. Compared with carefully matched peers who didn’t provide care, caregiving grandmothers scored higher on memory and fluency tests at baseline. And they also showed slower cognitive decline over time.
Sure, grandfathers who provided care also performed better. But, unlike women, they didn’t seem to benefit from the same protection against cognitive decline.
To minimize bias, the researchers relied on propensity score matching. This approach helped level the playing field between caregivers and noncaregivers. It’s an approach that helped address a long-standing concern in the literature: that healthier adults might be the ones more likely to take on grandparenting in the first place.
Even with those controls in place, grandparenting itself remained linked to better cognitive performance. But when the researchers zoomed in on caregiving grandparents alone, one of their fundamental theories quickly fell apart. The number of days spent caring for grandkids failed to predict memory, verbal fluency, or rates of cognitive decline.
Simply put, more babysitting wasn’t necessarily better. Instead, how grandparents spent time with their grandchildren appeared to move the needle. Those who frequently engaged in mentally and socially stimulating activities tended to boast higher memory and verbal fluency scores. And those grandparents who prepared meals, helped with school drop-offs, or were simply “around if needed” also showed modest advantages, especially when it came to verbal fluency.
More Than the Spice of Life
But one factor stood out above the rest: variety.
Grandparents who engaged in a wider range of caregiving activities consistently showed better cognitive performance. Each additional type of activity predicted higher episodic memory and verbal fluency scores. This persisted even after researchers accounted for how often grandparents provided care overall.
The pattern resembles what researchers sometimes call “cognitive cross-training.” Just as physical fitness improves when people vary their workouts, mental engagement might benefit from switching between tasks that tap different skills.
It’s worth noting that none of the specific caregiving activities – or their variety – exposed links to slower cognitive decline over the five-year follow-up. The associations appeared to be strongest at the level of overall cognitive performance. That leaves open the possibility that cognitively healthier grandparents might just be better equipped to take on diverse caregiving roles.
Gender differences complicated things further. While both grandmothers and grandfathers showed cognitive advantages from caregiving, only grandmothers demonstrated slower decline. In some sensitivity analyses, younger caregiving grandfathers actually experienced steeper declines in verbal fluency than their noncaregiving peers. But the authors warn about reading too much into that.
Looking for Explanations
One possible explanation? How the grandparents experience the time spent babysitting.
Earlier studies had hinted that grandmothers are more likely to see caregiving as meaningful. On the other hand, grandfather might be steered more by a sense of obligation. If caregiving becomes stressful or overwhelming, it could counter the cognitive benefits.
Finally, this new discovery appears to be more nuanced than it appears. Caring for grandkids might support cognitive health in older adults, especially women. But it’s not because of the time spent babysitting. Mental stimulation, role diversity, and meaningful engagement appear to matter more than the minutes.
For aging grandparents, the message isn’t about doing more. It’s about doing different things. And doing them on their own terms.
Further Reading
Research Shows Challenges and Surprising Benefits of Aging
It Seems Kids Really Do Age Us
Older Adults Get More Curious. But Only If It Interests Them.
