BEIJING, Feb. 18 (Xinhua) -- A German study shows that people's brains do not "slow down" until they are 60 years old. The discovery overturns the previously widely accepted theory that the brain "slows down" from the age of 20.
Pictured here are students photographed on the campus of the University of California, Los Angeles on September 23, 2021. (Xinhua News Agency)
According to the British "New Scientist" weekly reported on the 17th, the above conclusions are based on a data analysis involving nearly 1.2 million people. The men, who were between the ages of 10 and 80, provided data for a Harvard University program aimed at eliminating racial bias. They categorize words or images, for example, to determine whether a face is black or white, and whether a word means good or bad.
A research team led by misha von Klaus, a psychologist at heidelberg University in Germany, used a cognitive model to analyze the above project data. The researchers found that answering questions the fastest at the age of 20 or so, most important is the speed of answering questions, rather than whether the answers are accurate; 14 to 16 years old, the "pure mechanical response" is the fastest, that is, the eyes see information and the hand presses the answer button the fastest.
Pictured here on November 20, 2019, at a community elderly activity center in Long Island, New York, USA, the elderly receive guidance from teachers to practice tai chi. (Photo by Xinhua news agency reporter Wang Ying)
The researchers say that as people get older, they make more cautious decisions and therefore respond more slowly, but not in their brains. Studies have shown that brain speed peaks around the age of 30, then declines slightly, and only begins to slow down after about the age of 60. As participants age, answer errors decrease, at least until the age of 60.
The researchers reported the findings in the newly published British journal Nature Human Behavior. They write in the paper that when making decisions, the reaction time is the sum of multiple processes, and the speed of brain operation cannot be measured only by the length of the reaction time. (Ou Sa)