Lifestyle medicine for optimising brain health: perspectives and acceptability across the lifespan

Understanding how Australians perceive brain health and the acceptability of engaging in lifestyle medicine activities to enhance it, is crucial for promoting the widespread adoption of such approaches. As lifestyle activities can enhance brain health across the lifespan, this study aimed to investigate how such perspectives differ with age. One thousand and nineteen Australian adults (64.01% female; aged 18–90 years, M age = 49.78, SD = 18.23) completed an online survey investigating perspectives towards brain health, the acceptability of lifestyle medicine to improve brain health, and factors influencing engagement in lifestyle medicine activities. The survey reflected the seven components of the Theoretical Framework of Acceptability (TFA) and brief text-responses were used to assess factors influencing engagement. Differences in participants’ responses were explored by age (i.e. early (18–39), middle (40–59), and late adulthood (over 60)). While most participants reported understanding the concept of brain health (92.6%) and believed it to be important (91.9%), less than half felt they had insight into the status of their own brain health (44.7%). Most participants reported feeling positive about using lifestyle medicine to enhance brain health (affective attitude, 79.4%) and that this approach aligned with their personal values (ethicality, 75.1%). They understood how lifestyle medicine worked (intervention coherence, 89.4%) and believed it to be effective (perceived effectiveness, 86.7%). Fewer participants found the burden of engaging in lifestyle medicine activities (55.5%), what they would have to give up (opportunity cost, 43.5%), and their self-efficacy to engage (self-efficacy 64.9%) to be acceptable. Participants in early adulthood found engaging in lifestyle medicine activities to be more acceptable across affective attitude, ethicality, intervention coherence, and perceived effectiveness, while older adults reported them to be less burdensome. The most common factors influencing engagement were a lack of time due to competing priorities, a need for access to cost-effective facilities and services, and having positive social influences. Australian adults view lifestyle medicine as an acceptable approach to enhancing brain health. There is, however, an appreciation of the time, resource, and social challenges associated with making long-term healthy lifestyle changes, which differ with age. Individual and public health programs seeking to enhance brain health through lifestyle medicine activities should be tailored to address the unique needs and perspectives of each age group.