This study aims to investigate the associations between childhood health, childhood socioeconomic status and dementia risk in later life, and to assess the potential modifying effects of their interaction. The study also accounted for key confounders to better clarify these relationships within the Indonesian population.

Cross-sectional study.

Indonesia.

6693 aged 50+.

Individuals in the ‘unhealthy’ childhood health cluster had 1.17 times higher odds of dementia risk compared with the ‘healthy’ cluster (95% CI: 1.00 to 1.38), a borderline association, while those in the ‘poor socioeconomic status’ cluster had 1.39 times higher odds compared with the ‘non-poor’ cluster (95% CI: 1.15 to 1.68). No significant interaction was found between childhood health and socioeconomic status on either the multiplicative (OR=0.88, 95% CI: 0.30 to 2.57) or additive scale (all relative excess risk due to interaction, attributable proportion and synergy index measures non-significant). Older age, lower education, lower wealth, lower social capital and higher depression scores are significantly associated with increased dementia risk.

This study finds that both childhood health and socioeconomic status independently influence dementia risk in later life. No significant interaction between these two early-life factors was found, suggesting that their effects on dementia risk operate independently rather than synergistically. Using nationally representative Indonesian data, the findings highlight the importance of addressing early-life adversity in dementia prevention and call for standardised definitions to improve research comparability, particularly in low-income and middle-income countries contexts.