TY  - JOUR
T1  - LAte-life social activity—reply
AU  - Buchman AS, Boyle PA, Wilson RS, Fleischman DA, Leurgans SE, Bennett DA
Y1  - 2009/11/09
N1  - 10.1001/archinternmed.2009.409
JO  - Archives of Internal Medicine
SP  - 1932
EP  - 1932
VL  - 169
IS  - 20
N2  - 
We thank Verkleij et al for their comments regarding our recent article.1 We agree that the social activity measure used in our study includes components of physical and cognitive activities. It is for this reason that in our analyses we carefully controlled for physical and cognitive activities, in addition to many other potential confounding variables such as disability, cognitive function, depressive symptoms, body mass index, and chronic medical conditions.1 The association of social activity with motor decline remained robust even after controlling for these covariates, supporting the hypothesis that social engagement may make a unique and independent contribution to the maintenance of motor abilities above and beyond physical and cognitive activities. Notably, however, causal inferences must be drawn with caution in all observational cohort studies. Moreover, we agree that the ongoing trial of the Experience Corps will not settle this issue because the volunteer program is heterogeneous and includes factors that extend beyond social engagement. However, early results suggest that the program may benefit motor abilities, and we are unaware of any other ongoing intervention trials that include social engagement with motor function as an outcome.2

SN  - 0003-9926
M3  - doi: 10.1001/archinternmed.2009.409
UR  - http://dx.doi.org/10.1001/archinternmed.2009.409
ER  -