It is widely recognised that the brain needs to work so that dementia is prevented or delayed.
When people go to work, both men and women, they come up across problems in their work day and the problem solving “works” the brain so that the risk of dementia is mitigated.
In the “old” days, autocue never existed and news presenters had to think on their feet. So, the brain works harder as it needs to do.
But, in this day and age, news presenters just read whatever is on the autocue. Seasoned presenters will spot errors and work out in their brain that they do not have to say what is on the autocue and say what is supposed to be said.
Inexperienced presenters, on the other hand, just read out whatever is on the autocue verbatim. I came across it today when there was an obvious spelling mistake on the autocue but the presenter just read it out without even thinking and, for me, it made the presenter poorer for it.
You do not hear about presenters of the old days getting dementia but I am very concerned that with the advent of autocue, in times to come there will not only be early onset dementia but a dearth of presenters with dementia, as they get older.
Autocue was designed to make things easier for presenters but, with such reliance on these systems, I really worry that the organisations that use it to the extreme, are stirring up a lot of trouble for themselves and, worse still, the presenters themselves are destined to have a very difficult twilight of their careers, with so many of them succumbing to dementia after they have retired at say 60 or 65.
David's Diatribe 