Researchers found that men and women aged between 62 and 74 who described their sex life as “very pleasurable and satisfying” had better cognitive health scores five years later than those who had rated sex less enthusiastically. The results could be due to the stress-relieving benefits of good sex, the researchers said, as well as the release of the pleasure hormone, dopamine. “Stress prevents the new formation of neurons [neurogenesis] in the hippocampus, an area of the brain associated with memory,” they wrote in their research paper.
“Older adults who enjoy satisfying sexual activities may experience decreased stress that may in turn protect neurogenesis,” they explained. And there was even better news for those aged 75-90, the study found: their sex didn’t even have to be all that good, it just had to be frequent. “That sexual frequency matters in older ages may be because having any sex in these later years, regardless of sexual quality, is beneficial for health outcomes,” they wrote in their paper, published in the Journal of Sex Research.
Want a cognitive boost? Come reap the XXX benefits of NiteFlirt!