Brain Power Can Improve With Age

Science has long made us believe that intellectual power declines with age, reaching its peak at 40. But new studies are revealing quite the opposite.

By Martie Salt
Source: News 14 Carolina

Barbara Hustedt Crook, 60, rehearses a song she has composed for her first musical. Crook says in the past, she never would have imagined taking on such a challenge at this age.

"I wouldn't have thought to take a risk like this, and if I had the thought, I probably would have let it go the wayside," she said.

It's no surprise Crook's creativity is peaking. While it has long been thought the brain is powering down with age, some disagree.

"The brain is definitely more agile because the brain is less crowded with all the details of growing up, having families, working, and all the rest," said psychologist Anne-Renee Testa, Ph.D.

Testa says the term midlife crisis -- often associated with a negative experience -- is actually becoming a positive reorienting for many older adults.

Psychologist Anne-Renee Testa says your brain becomes more agile as you age.

Researchers at the University of California at Berkeley interviewed women at ages 27, 43, 52 and 61, and found increased tolerance for the uncertainties of life peaked in the 50s. Studies also show at that age, the left and the right brains tend to work together more ... instead of separately.

"You begin to say to yourself, 'What the heck am I afraid of?'" Testa said.

For Crook, this is a time of confidence and daring mental leaps.

"In way, it's the happiest time of my life, I feel the most fulfilled," she said.

Soon she hopes her name will be in lights at New York's Workshop Theater Company -- proof of her "coming of age."

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