Some people really do get better with age. Here’s why

Is the key to better aging in our minds?

By Claire Cameron edited by Jeanna Bryner

Cheese and wine aren’t the only things that get better with age: many older adults also show significant improvements in their physical and cognitive health over time, according to a new study. The reason seems to lie in how they think about aging.

People who viewed aging positively were more likely to show improvements in their cognitive skills and their walking speed. In contrast, people in the study who had more negative ideas about aging tended to see a decline in these skills. It suggests that people’s beliefs can have a dramatic effect on their biology, the researchers say.

“Our findings suggest that there is often a reserve capacity for improvement later in life,” study co-author Becca Levy, a professor of social and behavioral sciences at Yale University, said in a statement. “And because age beliefs are modifiable, this opens the door to interventions at both the individual and societal levels.”

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Levy’s previous research has shown that a person’s view of aging can predict the risk of developing memory and sleep problems, cardiovascular conditions and even biomarkers linked to Alzheimer’s disease.

The new study included more than 11,000 adults aged 65 and over and was published Thursday in Geriatrics. Over 12 years, 45 percent of the participants saw a positive development in either their score on a cognitive test or their walking speed – a critical measure of fitness. Many others saw no change in their cognitive skills during the study period.

In particular, when the researchers averaged the participants’ scores, they saw an expected decline in ability as people aged. But on an individual level, that picture did not hold up for everyone.

“Many people equate aging with an inevitable and continuous loss of physical and cognitive abilities,” Levy said. “What we found is that improvement in later life is not rare, it is common, and it should be included in our understanding of the aging process.”

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