A new study shows that white Americans retire with three times the cognitive decline of blacks. The decline was twice as high in men as in women, according to the study published in the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society.
Cognitive decline refers to mental skills such as thinking, memory, and Xi.
The researchers followed 2,226 people over a decade.
The decline was largest for white men and the smallest for black women.
Exposure to lifelong structural inequalities may actually alleviate the transition to retirement in terms of cognitive aging," lead author Ross Andel told Bloomberg at Arizona State University. "That's because long-standing racial disparities in U.S. education and hiring practices mean that Black workers face significant barriers to entering more attractive jobs.
According to the study, Black Americans may also experience less cognitive loss in retirement because they have access to "more well-established social support networks and cultural Xi Xi that favor community cohesion to a greater extent than typical of white adults."
Surprisingly, people who went to college showed a greater decline than those who didn't," Neuroscience News reported.
Research shows that some people have had a "mental retirement" before actually retiring, or have been out of work for a while. The researchers found that men with more incomes, especially white men, also suffered cognitive loss as they approached retirement.
White workers, especially white men, may be more likely to experience greater loss of identity, engagement and direction in life as they enter retirement," the study said.