The association between mental, social and physical activity and cognitive performance in young and old subjects.

The influence of mental, social and physical activity on fluid, crystallized and memory tasks was examined in 60 young and 56 elderly subjects using multiple regression. Once the influence of education, age, health and psychiatric morbidity was removed, physical activity was associated with higher fluid test performance in old but not in young subjects. Moreover, mental activity was associated with higher performance on fluid and crystallized tasks for subjects with low education but not for subjects with high education.