Hello and welcome to Zoe Recap, where each week we find the best bits from one of our podcast episodes to help you improve your health.

Today we're exploring the impact of social interactions on our health.

Last year, a study found that a third of Americans aged between 50 and 80 feel lonely.

I'm sure most of us can relate to this feeling and understand how a lack of social connection can take a serious toll on our mental health.

But is loneliness affecting more than just our minds? Does it also impact our physical health and how well we age?

In this episode, Professor Roseanne Kenny joined me to answer these questions and discover

ways that we can foster meaningful relationships. She starts by telling us about her groundbreaking

study into aging in Ireland. So it's a longitudinal study on aging, much like the twin study

at King's. And we follow the same people aged 50 and over every two years and apply the same tests to them every two years. And we do everything. Because we're trying to understand the tapestry of what it's like to have the experience of aging in Ireland. What does

all that tapestry, all that color look like? So from a health perspective, we do subjective health

asking about, do you have this? Do you have that? Do you feel this from a health perspective?

From a health perspective, we also do objective measurements. We measure blood pressure. We measure brain blood flow. We do MRI scans of brains. We measure your walking speed. We measure your bone density, etc. We do genetic measurements, including the clocks. We were talking about the epigenetic clocks. We do nutritional assessments, including now, feces, stools for microbiome.

I'm glad to hear that. Big beliefs of microbiome here.

I know. Mental health measures, income and assets.

And the funny thing there is when we had the discussions with the economists who were helping us with the study, we were going through the different questions because you can't ask. You can't cover everything in detail. So you have to cherry pick a bit. And they said, oh, no one's ever going to answer questions about incontinence. I said, well, they weren't telling how much money they have on the bank either. And I was right.

I was right.

The most difficult information to get is the economics information.

The rest is no problem.

We do a lot around work in retirement, Jonathan, because we're following people through their retirement period, etc.

Marital status, household structure, family networks and friendships and social participation

and how active you are both with your friends and family but also in volunteering and other

clubs and organizations and then of course education.

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