Our research

Read about our funded research projects, including the Lothian Birth Cohort 1936 study/The Disconnected Mind, with links to our collaborators and funders.

The Lothian Birth Cohort 1936 study/The Disconnected Mind

Principal investigator: Dr Simon Cox

Funded period: various

Summary:

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.

From Genetic Sequence to Phenotypic Consequence: Genetic and environmental links between cognitive ability, socioeconomic position, and health (GS2PC)

Principal Investigator: Dr W. David Hill

Funded period: October 2020 – September 2025

Summary:

This project examines how our genes and environment relate to cognitive ability and how these influence our physical and mental health, as well as more biologically distal phenotypes such as socioeconomic position. While previous research has established that genetic variation is associated with cognitive ability and that the genetic variants linked to cognitive ability overlap with those associated with physical and mental health as well as socioeconomic position, it currently remains unclear how these associations arise and interact. David's GS2PC research will help us understand how genetic and environmental factors that are associated with cognitive ability can influence our health and well-being.

Recently completed funded research

Lifecourse of place: How environments throughout life can support healthy ageing

Principal investigator: Dr Jamie Pearce 

Co-investigators: Professor Niamh Shortt 

Funder: Economic and Social Research Council’s Secondary Data Analysis Initiative 

Funded period: September 2020 – September 2022

Summary:

This project examined whether and how exposure to green space, air pollution and area-level deprivation in childhood, adulthood and old age affects healthy ageing. 

The researchers used the Lothian Birth Cohort 1936 data, including information collected from historical records about the neighbourhoods that the participants have lived in throughout their lives to examine these questions.

The key findings are summarised in this short animation: Healthy ageing and the environment

Published outputs:

Baranyi, G., et al. (2024). Life-course neighbourhood deprivation and brain structure in older adults: The Lothian Birth Cohort 1936. Molecular Psychiatry. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41380-024-02591-9

  • Bottom line: Life-course neighbourhood deprivation may be linked to adverse brain structure characteristics in older adults.

Baranyi G., et al. (2023). Neighbourhood deprivation across eight decades and late-life cognitive function in the Lothian Birth Cohort 1936: a life-course study. Age & Ageing. https://doi.org/10.1093/ageing/afad056

  • Bottom line: People living in more deprived neighborhoods in childhood and middle age are at greater risk of worse cognitive outcomes.

Baranyi G., et al. (2022). Association of life-Course neighborhood deprivation with frailty and frailty progression from ages 70 to 82 years in the Lothian Birth Cohort 1936. American Journal of Epidemiology. https://doi.org/10.1093/aje/kwac134

  • Bottom line: Living in deprived neighbourhoods across the life course contributes to frailty and frailty progression, but associations may differ between males and females.

Baranyi G., et al. (2022). Life-course exposure to air pollution and biological ageing in the Lothian Birth Cohort 1936. Environment International. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envint.2022.107501

  • Bottom line: Greater exposure to air pollution in earlier life may be associated with faster biological ageing, which likely persists across the entire life course.

This interdisciplinary project ran from September 2020 for 24 months and involved expertise from human geography, psychology, epidemiology and landscape architecture, included partners from policy and advocacy, and was funded by the Economic and Social Research Council’s Secondary Data Analysis Initiative (grant award ES/T003669/1).

You can read more about this and related research on Open Space: The research centre for inclusive access to outdoor environments

Lifetime musical experience and healthy ageing

Principal investigator: Dr Judith Okely

Co-investigators: Dr Katie Overy and Dr Michelle Luciano 

Funded period: November 2019 - April 2022

Summary:

Music is with us throughout life: from nursery rhymes to playing in a band or joining a choir in retirement. These are enhancing experiences for many of us, but could making or listening to music also help us tackle challenges related to ageing? This project examines associations between musical experience and various aspects of healthy ageing using data from the Lothian Birth Cohort 1936. The results could lay the groundwork for establishing whether musical experience - and experience playing a musical instrument in particular - is beneficial for older people.

Further information: