Aging – Chances for Longevity

Aging – Chances for Longevity

Today, there are a lot of gerontology researches that attempt to discover the “Fountain of Youth” in order to find eternal life. Unfortunately, this mythical spring has not been found, but anyway, there are several factors that may increase longevity.

Insights into Gerontology

First of all, let’s understand what gerontology is and how this discipline can improve our lives. The term “gerontology” comes from the Greek geron, “old man”, and logy, “study of”. In other words, this is the study of psychological, social and biological aspects of aging. Gerontology is a multidisciplinary science that incorporates various fields and subfields that study people as they age.

Gerontology scientists study aging according to four processes: biological aging, chronological aging, social aging, and psychological aging. Biological process of aging refers to the physical changes in organ systems. Chronological aging is defined as the process of aging based on the years lived from birth. Social aging refers to the changing roles of an individual in relationships with family, friends, colleagues, etc. Psychological aging refers to the changes in cognitive abilities, sensory and perceptual processes, adaptive abilities, and personality.

As we can see, gerontology encompasses almost each aspect of our life. As a result, this science is able to help us lead a longer and better life. Gerontologists carry out a huge amount of researches every day in order to find the keys to long and happy life and they succeed little by little.

Longevity Genes

Even if scientists still cannot predict how long we a going to live, today they have come to this issue closer than ever. They have discovered a suite of 150 long life variants in 70 genes that allowed them to guess if an individual can live to be a hundred.

The newly discovered gene variants may hold down genes associated with diseases related to aging, including heart illnesses and dementia. A biostatistician at the Boston University School of Public Health states that it is just a genetic susceptibility; it doesn’t mean that we are going to live into our 90s or even longer, because there are a lot of things in life that can happen to us.

The environment, our lifestyle, and even luck, play a crucial role in determining human longevity – as 23% of centenarian subjects who have been tested lack the telltale gene variants. Probably this minority lived a longer life because they avoided risk factors, such as smoking, abuse of red meat, etc.

Six Factors of Longevity

The gerontologist Peter Martin at Iowa State University has determined six important behavioral factors that may increase human longevity:

1. Social Support

It is impossible to live long by yourself. You should have a family, health facilities, community, etc. Also, you need financial resources to be able to survive.

2. Personal Characteristics

This factor deals with things such as gender, where women are more likely to live longer than men. Ethic groups differences, where life expectancy is higher for whites and lower for African-Americans.

3. Behavioral Capabilities

This has to do with the things we do every day, i.e. being active, having good cognitive functioning, etc. which play an important role in promoting a longer life.

4. Stay Healthy

Here we should point out the things we are able to do in order to be physically healthy. Obviously, there is a biological part in all these things, but anyway, it has to do a lot with our responsibility.

5. Proper Nutrition and Strong Health

It is well known that what we eat and the way we stay fit influence the quality of our life. That is why it is very important to practice proper nutrition and improve our physical health.

6. Mental Health

The more optimistic you are the greater the chances for a long life. Hence, it is important to avoid stress and things that may lead to depressions.

In the future, scientists believe to discover functional variants of longevity genes that would give us the opportunity to live to be a hundred. Obviously, people’s lifespan does not depend entirely on genetics, but however, scientists say that more than 15% of controls in their studies had genetic signatures that led to exceptional longevity.

Anyway, we should do our best to bear in mind the factors that can help us live to 100, until science identifies new methods to influence the probability of extreme longevity. 

Info presented by Vista Brokers