- Physiological age — how old cells are — is different from birth age.
- Lifestyle choices can increase or decrease a person's physiological age.
- A study of English adults found engaging with culture is a lifestyle choice that can slow aging.
If you like seeing movies at a theater, exploring museums or enjoying music at a concert, you may be slowing your body’s aging without even knowing it.
A study published Tuesday in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health said engaging in cultural experiences could be linked to slower physiological aging.
When people get older, their bodies’ cells, tissues and organs age along with them, which is the process of physiological aging. But a person’s physiological age can be different from their chronological, or birth, age, depending on their lifestyle, according to Mayo Clinic.
The benefits of a culturally engaged life
The observational study, led by Yusuke Matsuyama, Sakura Kiuchi and Jun Aida of the Institute of Science Tokyo, analyzed data from 1,899 adults 50 and older who participated in the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing in England. The participants were about evenly split between men and women.
A questionnaire assessed how often they went to the cinema, a museum, an art gallery, a theater, a concert or the opera.
Then, to determine their physiological age, the participants’ pulse, body mass index, grip strength and walking speed were measured, among other tests.
The results showed that people who reported engaging in cultural activities “every few months or more” had a mean physiological age of 66.9, while the mean age of those who did not participate in cultural activities as often was 69.9.
The study also concluded that “a one-point higher cultural engagement score was significantly associated with a 0.085-year lower physiological age,” or about 31 days, according to Medical News Today.
“Individuals with cultural engagement every few months or more were more likely to be women, have higher socioeconomic status, be in paid employment and have better health conditions,” the study said.
Things to note
Medical News Today quoted Dr. Anna Chodos, a professor in the Division of Geriatrics at the University of California, San Francisco, and executive director of Dementia Care Aware, who was not involved in the study. She said it is important to note the study was observational.
“We know that cognitive stimulation and social engagement lead to better physiologic aging, so this makes sense that it would be protective for these adults as they age,” Chodos said.
“So, we hope that being engaged is protective of dementia, but it is also possible that some people may be more capable of being engaged. Someone whose cognitive decline limits them from going out to the theater would also have that factor as a health contributor for physiological aging.”
Other professionals interviewed by Medical News Today said the findings are encouraging, but more studies should be done and should include diverse populations.