Grant: Travel Awards - Institute Community Support

Maintaining sleep quality and cognitive health are critical for healthy ageing. Specifically, poor sleep quality is linked to impaired cognitive performance across the lifespan and with dementia in late life. Thus, effective lifestyle strategies which can positively impact both are greatly needed. One potential strategy is promoting physical activity (PA). Strong empirical evidence suggests PA promotes cognitive health, and there is increasing evidence PA may maintain cognitive health by promoting better sleep. In addition, preliminary evidence suggests PA may help maintain circadian rhythm alignment, which weakens with age leading to declines in sleep quality and cognitive function. Thus, this symposium will provide a summary of the current evidence for 1) the implications of poor sleep on cognitive health; 2) how PA and sleep are linked to cognitive function and each other; and 3) how PA may be useful in circadian re-alignment (i.e., chronotherapy) to promote sleep and cognitive health.