You might want to be a little more optimistic towards old people because it appears negative thoughts could speed up the development of Alzheimer’s disease.
Researchers from the Yale School of Public Health took 158 healthy people in their 40s without dementia to answer how they felt about age stereotypes. A scale was used with statements like “older people are absent-minded” or “older people have trouble learning new things.”
25 years later the same people aged around 68 years old, began a decade of annual MRI brain scans to determine the volume of hippocampus (loss of volume in that brain region associated with Alzheimer’s.) People with more negative age stereotypes earlier had greater loss of hippocampus volume.
In a second study they used brain autopsies of people who had their attitudes about aging measured. Once again it appeared people with negative attitudes had more of a build up in the brain of amyloid plaques and neurofibrillary tangles.
Your thoughts and beliefs on aging today might just affect your quality of life later. Mind over matter!
