Our research

The Lothian Birth Cohort 1936 study/The Disconnected Mind

The Lothian Birth Cohort 1936 study has been funded by Age UK under the title of the ‘Disconnected Mind’ project since 2004. It is a multi-disciplinary research project, based at the University of Edinburgh, that examines why some people’s brains and thinking skills age better than others’.

At the project’s core is the Lothian Birth Cohort 1936 (LBC1936). This is a group of people born in 1936, and now in their 80s, for whom the research team has validated IQ data at age 11, collected during the Scottish Mental Survey of 1947. These rare and valuable childhood data provide a baseline for studying cognitive change from youth to later life, and then longitudinally within older age.

Of the 70,805 11-year olds who took the 1947 Survey, 1,091 people, mostly living in the Edinburgh City and surrounding Lothian areas, were recruited to the LBC1936 between 2004 and 2007, when they were about 70 years old.

The Disconnected Mind research team have examined the LBC1936 participants every three years from age 70, collecting an extraordinarily wide range of data from them. In addition, the team continuously looks for new areas of data collection as they become available with the progress of knowledge and technological advancement.

Further information:

The Disconnected Mind/Age UK

Other on-going funded research

Along with the data previously collected from the Lothian Birth Cohort 1921 (LBC1921) study, LBC1936 and LBC1921 provide the core data for all research and collaborative projects carried out. You can find out about them below.