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208 • Chapter 7

                                  In Chapter 6, you learned about the results of various
                              studies that demonstrated a relationship between your
                              health and your mental agility. Also, remember (of course
                              you do—you’ve been practicing) that in Chapter 2 we
                              showed you the various areas of the brain. We discussed
                              them in reference to Gardner’s multiple intelligences, which
                              are linguistic, musical, logical-mathematical, spatial, kines-
                              thetic, naturalist, and personal. Like a body builder who
                              wants the entire physique well developed and strong, you
                              want all aspects of your mental abilities to be vigorous and
                              well developed. Chapter 6 dealt with many of these intelli-
                              gences in the context of possible alterations and improve-
                              ments to your way of life.
                                  We have given you many suggestions on methods to im-
                              prove the quality of your life throughout this text and dis-
                              cussed why each one was important to both your overall
                              health and your mental agility. These suggested strategies
                              were based on well-grounded research by many individuals
                              and groups. One of the researchers we mentioned was Dr. K.
                              Warner Schaie. We are going to introduce you to some of his
                              other results and especially those he obtained working with
                              Dr. Sherry Willis, his wife. If you have been skimming over
                              the technical sections of the book so far, we encourage you to
                              read this section anyway. This is the basis of our reasons for
                              writing this book. This is, shall we say, The Big Payoff.



                              THE BIG PAYOFF
                              K. Warner Schaie directs one of the most extensive longitu-
                              dinal research programs on intellectual functions over the
                              adult ages. The Seattle Longitudinal Study began in 1956.
                              More than 5,000 participants ranging in age from 22 to 95
                              were interviewed and tested in seven-year cycles. Results
                              indicated that participants gained in proficiency through
                              their early forties and then functioned at approximately the
                              same level throughout the rest of their forties through their
                              late fifties or sixties. As Table 7-1 indicates, most participants
                              actually maintained stable performances on most cognitive
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