Psychology: Why do you age more slowly from year to year?

The older we get, the less our perceived age matches reality – according to surveys. How do researchers explain this effect of self-renewal and why does it increase from generation to generation?

When someone asks me my age, I have to do the math every time. I can answer it roughly, but I don't know exactly. A good friend who feels the same way told me: “At some point, the number no longer matters, making it unnecessary to know.”

As adults, we don't look forward to a birthday that gives us the right to vote or drive. We don't count how many times we have to sleep in order to get gifts and cake. We are getting older without noticing it. The further we go in this process, the more often we fall behind. This increases the likelihood that we will look in the mirror, see our wrinkles, and think, “Oops, when did that happen?”

Surveys show: Many people struggle with “self-renewal”

In this context, scientists talk about the effect of “self-renewal”: studies show that the lifespan of many people lags behind their actual age from one year to the next. According to an analysis conducted by researchers at Alexander von Humboldt University in Berlin, the effect is currently increasing from generation to generation.

The data the research team used in the analysis comes from the German Aging Survey (DEAS): a representative survey of about 15,000 adults aged 40 and over, which has been conducted approximately every three years since 1996. According to this study, people in the second half On average, they live about 11.5 percent younger than they are: 40-year-olds estimate themselves to be about 35 years old, 50-year-olds estimate themselves to be about 44 years old, and 60-year-olds estimate themselves to be about 44 years old. . Age is 53 years old. Subjective age is increasing so as the aging process continues, the discrepancy between feeling and mathematical reality increases.

If we look at the birth cohorts of the participants, as the research team in Berlin did, we see that the discrepancy in question tends to grow: 60-year-olds who were born in 1936 felt like they were 53, and 60-year-olds who were born In 1960 they felt like they were 49.5 years old. The 50-year-olds of the 1946 generation estimated their age to be 44, while the 50-year-olds of the 1972 generation estimated their age to be just under 42. If this trend continues, today's children in their 60s may feel like they are in their early 40s.

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It is important to emphasize that all the numbers mentioned are average values. Some 50-year-olds may feel like they're 32 – and some 40-year-olds may feel like 50. In such a case, that is, when the subjective age is higher than the chronological age, there are usually reasons such as loneliness or chronic diseases, as DEAS and similar international studies indicate. This, in turn, may provide a clue to a possible explanation for why people tend to think of themselves as relatively younger as they age: they are in good shape. They are healthy. They are enjoying their life.

Why do we think we age more slowly than we do on paper?

Scientists generally assume that subjective age can provide information about a person's health: the younger a person feels, the fitter he or she is. But there is no doubt that there are other factors that also play a role in classifying personality on the age scale.

Psychologists at Humboldt University, for example, suggest that the trend toward increased self-renewal could be an expression of an internal demarcation from the actual age group, which in turn was primarily driven by negative stereotypes of aging.

However, American psychology professor Art McMann wrote in an article in Psychology Today that we feel less old when we feel complete about ourselves. For example, if we can relate to youth language expressions like “No Pascal, I don't think so” or current charts and string trends, and if technological and social changes stimulate us rather than immediately overwhelm us. Therefore mental flexibility and curiosity can be key drivers of self-renewal.

American journalist Jennifer Senior, who covers aging in an article in The Atlantic, quotes a 53-year-old friend who says he is 35: “I think it's age that sets the defining questions/parameters in my life.” They arrived at answers/levels where they remain to this day.” Jennifer Senior herself, who is arithmetically 53, and 36 in her head, has a similar explanation when she writes: “At 36, I was clear about the broad outlines of my life; But I haven't filled it yet.” And to this day it has not exhausted them. In their view, the two have not grown up because the very important things in their lives have not changed so starkly: demands, values ​​and expectations on the one hand and potential, energy, resources, motivation and drive to influence on the other.

Ultimately, very different things can influence how old we feel: how old we imagine we are, how we see other people in our age group, how we perceive and experience ourselves, how fun-loving and included we are, and whether or not we actually are teenagers. then. Our age may have a mathematical dimension, but I would agree with my dear friend: the number doesn't matter. What matters most is the time we have to experience it.

Bridget