"Many grandparents provide regular care for their grandchildren—care that supports families, and society more broadly—but an open question is whether caregiving for grandchildren may also benefit grandparents themselves," said lead researcher Flavia Chereches.

This researchers wanted to see if providing grandchild care might benefit grandparents' health, potentially slowing down cognitive decline.

Ms Chereches, a doctoral candidate at Tilburg University in the Netherlands, and her colleagues examined data from 2,887 English grandmas and grandads all older than 50, with an average age of 67.