The age your brain reaches its peak has been revealed
The human body naturally declines as part of ageing. However, new research has revealed that even if you’re over the age of 50, you still haven’t yet reached your cognitive peak. It’s thought that we reach our physical peak in our mid-to-late 20s and our optimal happiness in our early 20s or in retirement. Our psychological peak though is another matter (Picture: Getty)
New research, published in the journal Intelligence reveals that humans’ cognitive ability is at its best between the ages of 55 to 60, and the researchers say that knowing this highlights why people in this age range may be at their best for complex problem-solving and leadership in the workforce. In their study, the researchers said that while fluid intelligence, which is often believed to be the most important cognitive ability and peaks at around 20 years old, other dimensions like crystallised intelligence and emotional intelligence continued to improve (Picture: Getty)
So what did they do?
The researchers analysed age-related trends across nine markers linked to life success. These were cognitive abilities, personality traits, emotional intelligence, financial literacy, moral reasoning, resistance to sunk cost bias, cognitive flexibility, cognitive empathy, and need for cognition. Then they created two models to test this, and found that in both, overall functioning peaked during late midlife (Picture: Getty)
They also found that crystallised intelligence, responsible for applying acquired knowledge, decision-making and problem-solving, continues to improve as we age. Other traits such as emotional intelligence, moral reasoning, and resistance to the sunk cost fallacy also peak later on. The researchers also focused on well-established psychological traits beyond reasoning ability that can be measured accurately, which represent a person’s characteristics rather than temporary states (Picture: Getty)
The researchers say that they identified 16 psychological dimensions that met these criteria,among them core cognitive abilities such as reasoning, memory span, processing speed, knowledge and emotional intelligence – as well as the ‘big five’ personality traits – openness, conscientiousness, agreeableness, extraversion and neuroticism. They found that conscientiousness peaked around age 65, where as emotional stability peaked around age 75 (Picture: Getty)
The good news is that characteristics such as moral reasoning appear to peak in older adulthood, and the capacity to resist making irrational or less accurate decisions, may continue well into the 70s and even 80s. However, the bad news is that our cognitive ability tends to decline from around 65 years of age, and becomes more pronounced after age 75 (Picture: Getty)
Lead author, Dr Gilles Gignac of the University of Western Australia, told the Times: ‘The mix of accumulated knowledge, judgment and life experience is what shifts the overall peak of human functioning into the late fifties. So, while youth has advantages, maturity arguably brings a broader and more powerful set of tools for navigating complex problems and responsibilities. While some people might find this obvious, it had never been quantified and established scientifically’ (Picture: Getty) Add Metro as a Preferred Source on Google Add as preferred source
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