Page 142 - Mind Games The Aging Brain and How to Keep it Healthy

126 • Chapter 5

3. _____ Approximately 25 percent of all older adults
develop corneal cataracts.
4. _____ It is normal to become more forgetful as you age.
5. _____ According to the National Institute of Aging, 85
percent of all those over 85 years old live in res-
idential communities or nursing homes.
6. _____ Senility is inevitable in older people.
7. _____ Women’s sexual desire declines sharply as they age.

8. _____ Incontinence is a normal part of aging.
9. _____ Elders should prepare themselves and their fam-
ilies for their deaths by withdrawing from family
activities.

10. _____ The effects of prescription drugs diminish as we
age, so larger doses are required to gain the same
effects as before.
11. _____ Seniors experience less stress because of their
relaxed lifestyle.
12. _____ 75 percent of seniors dread getting older.

All the statements in the quiz you just took are false.
They are all common misconceptions of the aging process.
The changes in our physical and mental abilities pre-
sented in this chapter are generalizations. The exact amount
of the change is not the same for each individual. For exam-
ple, you know individuals whose hearing has declined
(some more than others) and other individuals whose hear-
ing remains unchanged. So when you read research results
or articles in newspapers that say “this” happens as we age,
remember that “this” is not written in stone. “This” depends
on individual characteristics, such as health and lifestyles
and may be true for some and not for others.
Speaking of research results, it is important to you as a
consumer of information to understand the manner in which
experimental results regarding the effects of aging are ob-
tained. Many research projects are cross sectional in format.
That means the comparisons are between, let’s say, a group of