Posted on 03/15/2009 4:35:25 AM PDT by yankeedame
...According to scientists, our mental abilities begin to decline from the age of 27 after reaching a peak at 22.
The researchers studied 2,000 men and women aged 18 to 60 over seven years. The people involved – who were mostly in good health and well-educated – had to solve visual puzzles, recall words and story details and spot patterns in letters and symbols. Similar tests are often used to diagnose mental disabilities and declines, including dementia. The research at the University of Virginia, reported in the academic journal Neurobiology Of Aging, found that in nine out of 12 tests the average age at which the top performance was achieved was 22.
The first age at which performance was significantly lower than the peak scores was 27 – for three tests of reasoning, speed of thought and spatial visualisation. Memory was shown to decline from the average age of 37. In the other tests, poorer results were shown by the age of 42.... Professor Timothy Salthouse...wrote: ‘Results converge on a conclusion that some aspects of age-related cognitive decline begin in healthy, educated adults when they are in their 20s and 30s.’
There is some good news, though....abilities based on accumulated knowledge, such as performance on tests of vocabulary or generalinformation, increase until at least the age of 60.
(Excerpt) Read more at dailymail.co.uk ...
Heck I’m 50 and don’t fill old at all! (Unless I start looking at it in dog years.)
I had a smart comment about this article, proving it was wrong, but I forgot it.
So since the logic and reasoning centers of the brain don’t fully develop until we’re 25, and at 27 we start to “lose it” that give us 2 good years of mental acuity. /sarc
that is ridiculous..I am 46 years old..I have not been “old” for 19 years..I am in excellent health..and I aaaarrrggggghhhhhh!!!!!
If you look at the pic of Beyonce, it appears her breasts have not yet begun their decline, even if her IQ has! LOL.
I have a short memory too and you know else I have a short memory but tv has no reruns now and every friend is a new friend.
But see, here’s the thing : this is a measure of raw processing power. The brain of someone very young is a processing machine. But the hard drive, if you will, is fragmented all over the place. The CPU of an older person may be the slightest bit slower, but the hard drive is full of access programs and in many cases is optimized and defragged so that peak raw processing power is not as important. Just watch out for malware, and I think you’ll find that most older brains are more than capable of making some pretty important connections; even better than their younger counterparts.
news: Brian declines before breasts.
Well I’m only 20 so I’m good for another seven years :)
They say learning a language and using the computer are good for your memory and your brain. I knew there had to be a plus for studying Russian, Arabic, Farsi, Urdu, and Pashtu!
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