The discovery of a link between genetics, age and late-onset dementia could help men identify their risk of developing the disorder later in life.
In research published in the August edition of the journal Neurology, Monash researchers Professor Kim Cornish and Dr Darren Hocking led a team which examined impulsivity, attention and working memory skills of men aged 18 to 69 years, who were all carriers.
Men who are carriers of the FMR1 (Fragile X Mental Retardation 1) gene may be at high risk of developing severe dementia as they age, despite having no obvious symptoms earlier in life.
Fragile X Syndrome is the leading inherited cause of intellectual disability and the most common known genetic cause of autism.
The FMR1 gene occurs in two stages: as a small-medium expansion (carriers) and as a large expansion. Those with the large expansion will have Fragile X Syndrome (FXS) and experience the full effects.
Approximately one in 250 women and one in 800 men will be carriers of the FMR1 gene. For many years, those who carried the gene were assumed to be unaffected by any of the challenges faced by those with FXS.
The men were tested for their ability to phase out irrelevant information as well as actively store short-term information. These core brain functions decline with late-stage dementia.
The research found that carriers of the gene who were at the upper end of the medium expansion were more likely to have problems with inhibition and remembering materials, demonstrating cognitive dementia symptoms, whereas those who had expansions just within the medium range appeared risk-free. [continue reading…]
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Older people cannot lie as convincingly as younger people, are worse at detecting when others are lying, and the latter is linked to age-related decline in emotion recognition, new University of Otago research suggests.
Department of Psychology researchers Ted Ruffman, Janice Murray and Jamin Halberstadt compared young and older adults’ skills at deception as judged by listeners within and outside their age group. Dr Murray presented the findings today at the Association of Psychological Science’s annual convention in Washington, D.C.
The study involved 60 participants being shown video clips of 20 people expressing their actual or false views on topical issues such as factory farming and stem cell use in humans. Ten of the speakers were aged 30 or under and 10 were 60 or over. Two clips of each speaker were shown; one in which they were lying, and the other being truthful.
The 60 listeners, who consisted of two equal-sized groups with average ages of 21 and 71, were asked to determine if the person in each clip was being truthful or lying. They also underwent tests that required judgments of emotional expression and age in faces.
Associate Professor Halberstadt says the results of the lie detection test showed that both young and older listeners found it easier to differentiate truths and lies when the speaker was an older adult compared to a young adult.
“It could be that older people are less convincing liars because the kinds of cognitive abilities required for successful deceit are also those that tend to deteriorate with age,” he says.
Lying places demands on memory and planning ability (e.g., formulating a plausible argument, keeping story facts straight) and on social understanding (e.g., judging whether a particular argument will convince a listener, as well as keeping track of a listener’s response as the lie unfolds to potentially alter the argument). [continue reading…]
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A book called You’re Looking Very Well,[*this is not an affliate link] written by Lewis Wolpert, emeritus professor of biology at University College London, suggests that most people were “averagely happy” in their teens and twenties, declining until early middle age as they try to support a family and a career. “But, from the mid-forties, people tend to become ever more cheerful and optimistic, perhaps reaching a maximum in their late seventies or eighties.
A study published by the American National Academy of Sciences, based on a survey of 341,000 people, found that enjoyment of life dwindled throughout early adulthood but began an upward trend in the late forties, and continued to increase until reaching a peak at 85. Read more
Source:TheTelegraph Time
