Neurotic Middle-Age Women More Prone to Alzheimer’s The Washington Post reports that middle-aged women who worry a lot may have a higher risk of developing Alzheimer‰Ûªs disease later in life, citing a studyåÊ in the American Academy of Neurology‰Ûªs journal, Neurology. The paper notes that researchers at the University of Gothenburg in Sweden ‰ÛÏfollowed a group of women in their 40s, whose disposition made them prone to anxiety, moodiness and psychological distress, to see how many developed dementia over the next 38 years.‰Û They found that women ‰ÛÏwho were the most easily upset by stress ‰ÛÓ as determined by a commonly used personality test ‰ÛÓ were two times more likely to develop Alzheimer‰Ûªs disease than women who were least prone to neuroticism.‰Û