Believing Myths About Aging Makes Growing Old Worse

 Believing Myths About Aging Makes Growing Old Worse

When it comes to how the brain changes over time, the news isn’t all bad. In fact, research now shows that our later years are a new stage of adult development, where three profound and positive changes take place in the brain.

First, certain genes activate only by experience, which means the brain remodels itself over time, adding depth and wisdom to our personalities.

Second, the brain learns to recruit regions underutilized in our earlier years, and this can help compensate for the cognitive decline that comes with age. Put differently, when we’re younger, one hemisphere of the brain might be entirely responsible for a particular type of information processing, but as we age, the brain recruits areas in the other hemisphere, which is a kind of neural redundancy that can offset age-related decline.

Third, the brain’s information processing capacities reach their greatest density and height between ages sixty and eighty, allowing the two hemispheres of the brain to work together like never before.