Playing a Musical Instrument as a Protective Factor against Dementia and Cognitive Impairment: A Population-Based Twin Study

Table 1

Sample characteristics ( pairs).

	Cases ()		Controls ()
Age (years)^1	(65–92)		(65–92)
Women	89 (56.7)		82 (52.2)
Men	68 (43.3)		75 (47.8)
Education (years)	(2–16)		(0–16)
Physical activity^2	(0–3)		(0–3)
Zygotic status
Monozygotic		39 (24.8)
Same-sex dizygotic		67 (42.7)
Opposite sex dizygotic		49 (31.2)
Indeterminate		2 (1.3)
Clinical diagnoses
Dementia	104 (66.2)
Cognitive impairment	53 (33.8)
Cognitively intact			157 (100)

Data are n (%) or means ± SD (range).
¹Mean age excludes pairs where control was not assessed in person due to death ( pairs).
²Physical activity was assessed using a 0–3 scale, where 0 is no activity and 3 is frequent activity.