‘Wisdom’ Helps Older Brains Keep Pace, Study Shows

Q. I notice that my elderly dad still is very bright, but he takes a while longer to process information. Is that part of aging and how can we help him keep his mind as well as his body in good shape?

Here’s a study that may explain what’s happening with your dad. In a matched test, the brains of older people were not as fast as those in a group of younger people, but they performed just as well because their brains are wiser, say Canadian researchers.

“It was already known that aging is not necessarily associated with a significant loss in cognitive function,” explains Dr. Oury Monchi, University Geriatrics Institute of Montreal. “We now have neurobiological evidence showing that with age comes wisdom and that as the brain gets older, it learns to better allocate its resources. When it comes to certain tasks, the brains of older adults can achieve very close to the same performance as those of younger ones,” Monchi added.

The study included a group of 24 people aged 18 to 35 and a group of 10 people aged 55 to 75 who were still active professionally. For this test, participants were asked to pair words according to different lexical rules, including semantic category (animal, object, etc.), rhyme, or the beginning of the word (attack).

“When the young participants made a mistake and had to plan and execute a new strategy to get the right answer, various parts of their brains were recruited even before the next task began. However, when the older participants learned that they had made a mistake, these regions were only recruited at the beginning of the next trial, indicating 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.”

That’s interesting information to consider. A mounting body of research also has shown that keeping the brain active is one important part of healthy aging. So anything you can do to encourage your dad to stay busy is valuable. The Carroll County Home Instead Senior Care® office has a number of resources for family caregivers at http://www.caregiverstress.com/ that can help keep seniors healthy and engaged.

For more information about Home Instead Senior Care of Carroll County, go to www.homeinstead.com/627.1. For more information about the study, visit http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2011-08/uom-css082511.php.