Researchers at Kuwait University conducted one of the most comprehensive surveys of dementia literacy attempted anywhere in the Middle East, and only the second in the world, after an Australian national survey, to simultaneously measure general knowledge, awareness of modifiable risk factors, belief in misconceptions, and stigma toward people living with dementia. The cross-sectional study, published in Frontiers in Public Health, recruited 733 adults residing in Kuwait through social media and email using a snowball sampling approach. Participants completed a validated questionnaire adapted from the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare’s Dementia Awareness Survey, incorporating the Dementia Knowledge Assessment Scale (DKAS), the Knowledge of Dementia Risk Reduction scales (KoDeRR-R and KoDeRR-M), and the Dementia Public Stigma Scale (DePSS). The study was approved by the Medical Research Ethics Committee of the Kuwait Ministry of Health.

The headline finding is stark: overall dementia knowledge was low, with a median DKAS score of just 19 out of a possible 50. A full 88.4 percent of respondents fell into the low-knowledge category, while only 1 percent achieved a high score. The gaps were not obscure technical details but foundational facts about the disease. Sixty-five percent of participants either wrongly believed that dementia is a normal part of aging or did not know whether it was, and 53.1 percent mistakenly believed or were unsure that people can recover from the most common forms of dementia. Nearly 85 percent could not correctly identify Alzheimer’s disease, rather than vascular dementia, as the most common form, and 87.3 percent were unaware that sudden cognitive onset is not characteristic of common dementias.

The researchers argue that this combination of beliefs creates a particularly harmful paradox. If people assume that cognitive decline is both an inevitable consequence of growing older and something that can be reversed later, they have little incentive to seek an early diagnosis or change their lifestyle. The authors note that this pattern of dual misconception severely discourages timely help-seeking, and that public education must make clear that while age is a risk factor, dementia is a disease process, and that although it is incurable, early intervention is vital for managing its progression. For comparison, only 27 percent of Australians in the national survey viewed dementia as a normal part of aging, and 44.7 percent of Poles, indicating that the Kuwaiti figure of 65 percent is exceptionally high.

Knowledge of modifiable risk factors told a more nuanced story. On the KoDeRR-R scale, participants showed a median score of 16 out of 28, indicating low but not negligible awareness. Majorities correctly identified reducing excessive alcohol consumption (87.6 percent), seeking treatment for depression (86.0 percent), maintaining healthy blood sugar, blood pressure, cholesterol, and body weight (roughly 84 percent each), avoiding head injury, following a Mediterranean diet, and not smoking as ways to lower dementia risk. Yet hearing aid use, increasingly recognized as a key protective factor, was identified by only 56.9 percent of respondents. The researchers also observed that most participants chose the softer response of agree rather than strongly agree, suggesting a layer of uncertainty beneath the apparent awareness.

Where misconceptions were concerned, the results were devastating. The median score on the misconception scale was zero out of 12, and 99.2 percent of respondents scored in the low range. Fewer than 14 percent correctly rejected the ideas that adding coconut oil to the diet or removing metal dental fillings could prevent dementia, and recognition was even lower for avoiding artificial sweeteners (7.8 percent), taking supplements such as ginkgo biloba (7.2 percent), using non-aluminum cookware (9.8 percent), and eating a protein-rich diet (6.4 percent). Because neutral or unsure responses were scored as zero, these figures reflect a combination of genuine belief in pseudoscientific claims and widespread inability to distinguish evidence-based advice from popular fiction. The coexistence of reasonable awareness of real risk factors with deep susceptibility to myths suggests an overall difficulty in separating science from misinformation.

Behaviorally, participants reported engaging in a median of 7 out of 14 possible risk-reducing activities, a figure notably higher than the 1.5 average reported in the Australian survey. The most commonly practiced behaviors, performed explicitly to reduce dementia risk, included staying physically and cognitively active (57.8 percent), managing depression (55.5 percent), avoiding head-injury-prone sports (54.8 percent), and following a Mediterranean diet (54.7 percent). The authors hypothesize that this engagement may be driven less by dementia awareness than by the region’s intensive cardiovascular and diabetes prevention campaigns. Less frequently adopted were behaviors with a direct dementia link but less public visibility, such as avoiding air pollution (42.6 percent) and using hearing aids when needed (37.1 percent). Encouragingly, 63.7 percent of respondents said they would be more likely to adopt lifestyle changes if they knew those changes could lower their dementia risk.

Stigma toward people living with dementia was moderate, with a median DePSS score of 62 out of 112, and it took a distinctive form. While outright behavioral discrimination was rare, with only 12.5 percent saying they would exclude people with dementia from activities and 11.7 percent saying they would ignore them, paternalistic attitudes were pervasive. More than 77 percent agreed that people with dementia should always be supervised, 69 percent believed they behave like children, 68.6 percent thought they are incapable of making personal decisions, and 64.1 percent felt they are no longer themselves. The researchers describe this profile as benevolent stigma: compassion combined with the systematic stripping away of adult autonomy. Notably, professional experience working with people with dementia was the only independent predictor of lower stigma in the multivariable analysis, and higher knowledge correlated with lower stigma, though the authors caution that the weak correlation sizes mean factual education alone may not suffice without interventions designed to foster empathy.

Logistic regression revealed who knew more and who knew less. Working or studying in the medical field was the strongest predictor of general knowledge, with an adjusted odds ratio of 8.53, and professional experience with people with dementia more than doubled the odds of sufficient knowledge. Married participants, unexpectedly, scored lower, an association the authors interpret cautiously, suggesting that within a sample where over a third were aged 18 to 24, marriage may proxy for family obligations that limit exposure to health information. Perhaps most strikingly, unlike studies in Australia and Europe where education, gender, and income strongly predict knowledge, no socioeconomic variable mattered in Kuwait: knowledge deficits were pervasive across all demographic strata, and even medical professionals showed limited awareness of risk factors and misconceptions.

Help-seeking behavior revealed a troubling gap between attitude and action. Although two-thirds of respondents said they would seek medical help if they experienced dementia symptoms, only half of those would do so immediately, and 17.5 percent were unsure what they would do at all. Disclosure was overwhelmingly confined to family and friends, with fewer than 5 percent willing to tell employers or colleagues. The authors conclude that Kuwait urgently needs comprehensive, population-wide public health initiatives to improve dementia literacy, correct misconceptions, promote evidence-based prevention, and reduce stigma, alongside stronger integration of dementia education into medical curricula. With an estimated 1.3 million people affected across the Arab world and Kuwait’s population steadily aging, the window for preventive action is open, but only for those who know it exists.

Subject of Research: Public dementia knowledge, risk reduction awareness, misconceptions, and stigma in Kuwait

Article Title: Dementia knowledge, risk reduction awareness, misconceptions, and stigma in Kuwait: a cross-sectional study

Article References: Awad, A., & Almutairi, A. (2026). Dementia knowledge, risk reduction awareness, misconceptions, and stigma in Kuwait: a cross-sectional study. Frontiers in Public Health, 14, Article 1941519. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpubh.2026.1941519

Image Credits: AI Generated

DOI: 10.3389/fpubh.2026.1941519

Keywords: dementia, Kuwait, public health, dementia literacy, modifiable risk factors, misconceptions, stigma, Alzheimer's disease, cross-sectional study, brain health, health education, Middle East