Researchers: Male Brains Shrink Faster

Researchers agree: the aging brains of men shrink more rapidly than aging brains of women. And researchers add that the male of the species is more "prone to age-related brain disorders such as memory loss and Alzheimer's disease."

Writing in the medical journal Archives of Neurology, physicians with the Detroit's Henry Ford Health System studied 330 healthy men and women between the ages of 66 and 96. Their conclusions: Men's brains shrink more rapidly than women's, but the "neurobiological bases for these sex difference in brain aging are not known."

Lead study author Dr. C. Edward Coffey says brain areas involving memory, planning and learning tended to be smaller in the men studied than the brains of the women. Shrinkage was significantly greater in men in the frontal and temporal lobes and in the parieto-occipital lobes in the rear of the organ.

Measuring cerebrospinal fluid outside the brain is an indication of how far the nervous system is reacting to brain shrinkage. The women studied registered only a 1 percent increase compared with a 32 percent increase for men, researchers say. But for those parts of the brain governing movement and speech, no variance in shrinkage was reported.