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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