Perhaps they had it right in Logan's Run.A professor Timothy at Virginia University found reasoning, speed of thought and spatial visualisation all decline in our late 20s. Worse, therapies designed to stall or reverse the ageing process may need to start much earlier.
The seven-year study of 2,000 healthy people aged 18-60 is presently being published in the journal Neurobiology of Aging. Yes, it's not on my list either. To test mental agility, the study participants had to solve puzzles, recall words and story details and spot patterns in letters and symbols. The natural decline of some of our mental abilities as we age starts much earlier than previously expected.
The same tests are already used by doctors to spot signs of dementia. In nine out of 12 tests the average age at which the top performance was achieved was 22. The first age at which there was any marked decline was at 27 in tests of brain speed, reasoning and visual puzzle-solving ability. Things like memory stayed intact until the age of 37, on average, while abilities based on accumulated knowledge, such as performance on tests of vocabulary or general information, increased until the age of 60. The findings suggested "some aspects of age-related cognitive decline begin in healthy, educated adults when they are in their 20s and 30s."
No comments:
Post a Comment