Ageing doesn’t always mean decline, particularly if you don’t expect it to. One study involving more than 11,000 participants found that almost half improved either their physical or mental capacity after their 65th birthday; people who improved on one or both metrics were likelier to have a positive view of ageing.
But what about personality?
A paper published in the journal Communications Psychology put 165 adults (a younger set in their 20s, and another group aged between 60 and 80) through an eight-week training course designed to help them handle stress and social situations.
They found what study author Professor Dr Cornelia Wrzus called a “striking and unexpected result” among the older cohort.
Over-60s seemed just as able to change their personalities as younger people
Participants were given personality tests before and at various stages after their training.
These aimed to find out about traits like emotional stability and extraversion.
Both groups performed better on these scores after the eight-week intervention, including a year after it ended.
“Investigations [on personality changes] frequently focus on young adults between the ages of 18 and 30,” Prof Wrzus said.
But after looking at the results of this study, the professor said her team found that the average change in behaviour barely varied between the age groups.
This was a “striking and unexpected result, since it seems more difficult for older adults to learn something new, like a foreign language or a musical instrument,” Prof Wrzus said.
Older people were more engaged in the study
The researchers also asked the participants to describe how intensively they practiced the tasks given to them during the training course.
They found that 60+-year-olds typically engaged more enthusiastically with things like coursework and at-home tasks, perhaps explaining the “unexpected” outcomes.
“Our study results somewhat contradict the adage that ‘you can’t teach an old dog new tricks’. That is good news for aging populations,” Prof Wrzus stated.
“When people are sufficiently motivated, they maintain the ability to change and learn new things.”
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