Older and Wiser! Beverley Wright MInstChP, BSc (Hons) PGCE, PGDip
Yes, it is true as we get older - we also get wiser!
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ell, according to the researchers at the University Geriatrics Institute of Montreal they have discovered that as we age, our brains do not slow down when compared to the equivalent level of performance of younger brains. In fact the Martins et al (2011) study found that the older brain does indeed become wiser, because of years of learned abilities and wisdom. So, is it safe to say or assume that the majority of us were already aware of the fact that the older we got, the wiser we will become?! Well, even some old proverbs, rhymes, poems and fables such as: Aesop’s fable the ‘Hare and the Tortoise’, the ‘Three Wise Monkeys (a pictorial maxim aka the ‘Three Mystic Apes’) from the Tōshō-gū shrine in Nikkō, Japan and ‘A Wise Old Owl’ by Edward H Richards, which most of us have either heard of or read about, seems to suggest we do. Particularly, as these depict the slow, non-challenging pace of the tortoise, the monkey’s wise message not to reflect or be exposed to evil and the patient behaviour of an old owl, which are all synonymous with age; but it is the latter we perceive as wisdom and one of the many favourable attributes we are likely to associate with getting older. As we learn more about ageism and the mental and physical changes that take place, we have come to understand that ageing does not always result in a significant lack of cognitive function (Monchi, 2011, Wang et al 2011); unless of course there is an age related disease and/or conditions that may then impair cognitive brain function and abilities to perform everyday tasks (Lizio et al, 2011). However, Martins et al (2011) study has now found the neurobiological evidence to show that as the brain gets older, it does in fact learn to better allocate its resources. Martins et al (2011) study set out to investigate how ageing affects brain patterns during the performance of a lexical analog of the Wisconsin Card Sorting Task, which has been shown to strongly depend on fronto-striatal activity. In other words the researchers proposed to explore the brain regions and pathways involved in the planning and execution of language pairing tasks. More importantly the researchers were interested in knowing what happens when they (the researchers) changed the rules of the tasks many times throughout the duration of the study to the unsuspecting participants. The sample of recruits in Martins et al (2011) study were divided into a group of 24 participants aged from 18 to 35 years old and a group of 10 participants aged 55 to 75 years old who were still professionally active (which could be good news for our ageing population of practicing Chiropodists, Podiatrists and Foot Health Practitioners). Both groups performed the same lexical set-shifting task, where each participant’s speed of execution and the relevance of their responses were evaluated. The participants brain activity was also examined using functional neuroimaging to indicate any activation of the fronto-striatal loops during the planning and execution stages of a given task. Outcomes of Martins et al (2011) study reveals that the younger brain is more reactive to negative reinforcement than the older one. The researchers discovered that when the younger participants made mistakes during their tasks, they had to plan and execute new strategies to get the right answer. Thereby, activating and recruiting various parts of their brains to resolve
the task, before undertaking the next one. However, in the older participants, when they made a mistake on a task their brains did not react or recruit from its various regions, until they had began the next task. This according to Dr Monchi indicates “that with age, we decide to make adjustments only when absolutely necessary. It is as though the older brain is more impervious to criticism and more confident than the young brain.” Dr Monchi (2011) concludes that “Overall, our study shows that Aesop's fable about the tortoise and the hare was on the money: being able to run fast does not always win the race – you have to know how to best use your abilities. This adage is a defining characteristic of aging.” References: Lizio R, Vecchio F, Frisoni GB, Ferri R, Rodriguez G, Babiloni C. 2011. Electroencephalographic rhythms in Alzheimer's disease. Int J Alzheimers Dis. 2011;2011:927573. Epub 2011 May 12. Martins, R., Simard, F., Provost, J-S., and Monchi. O. 2011. Changes in Regional and Temporal Patterns of Activity Associated with Aging during the Performance of a Lexical Set-Shifting Task. Cereb. Cortex (2011) first published online August 24, 2011 doi:10.1093/cercor/bhr222. Wang M, Gamo NJ, Yang Y, Jin LE, Wang XJ, Laubach M, Mazer JA, Lee D, Arnsten AF. 2011. Neuronal basis of age-related working memory decline. Nature. 2011 Jul 27;476(7359):210-3. doi: 10.1038/nature10243. Related Reading: Schuster L, Essig M, Schröder J. 2011. Normal aging and imaging correlations Radiologe. 2011 Apr;51(4):266-72. German.
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