Decision-Making Abilities of Older Adults
We make decisions everyday. It is what we do to remain highly functional and independent. We don’t question those decisions. And that could be a problem as we get older. Our aging brains change the way we process information and make decisions.
Everyone’s brain ages but our brain doesn’t know how old we are. Our brain ages by the way we treat it – good or bad. Normal aging can have a direct impact on how our brain functions. Here are some basic brain aging functions that we all experience:
Cognitive decline: Cognition is the umbrella term for planning, thinking, memory, executive function. Cognitive decline starts around age 25 with an acceleration point at age 50 and again at age 70.
Speed of Processing: This is one of the key indicators of cognitive decline. Speed of processing is the amount of time it takes to bring information into the brain, ruminate over it, and give a response. When we are at our cognitive peak – those responses are very fast. We have lots of neurons and connections participating in the communication process. As we get older, the loss of neurons and connections slows communication down. Our brain functions slower. A 60-year old brain is 2-3x slower than a 20-year old brain. An 80-year old brain is 5-6x slower than a 20-year old brain. That slow down impacts the functions of our brain.
Cognitive flexibility: Commonly known as mental multitasking. When multiple streams of information are coming into your brain at the same time – we used to be able to compare and contrast that information to make the best choices. An aging brain doesn’t have that flexibility anymore and all of this information becomes information overload.
Memory lapses: We probably identify with this loss more than any of the other aging losses. There is a phenomenon called Tip-of-the-Tongue that we all have experienced as we get older. This occurs when you are trying to remember a name, an event, a location, an item. You know what it is; you can see it; you know the first letter but you cannot remember the name or the item – or whatever it is you forgot. The memory isn’t gone – it just takes awhile to recover it. Our memory is affected by aging. It takes a lot of effort to actually forma a memory. The incoming signal comes in through working memory. The problem with working memory is that it is very vulnerable to distraction and it only holds a small amount of information for a very short period of time. Because of all of this we might not even be making the memories that we think we are forgetting.
Decline in financial skills: Money and finances are tough to handle with an aging brain. Finances are higher-order thinking and some of us might have losses in the prefrontal cortex and just struggle to work with our finances. Financial literacy declines as we get older. Studies have indicated that adults in the 60 – 80-year-old range typically have a low understanding of financial literacy in the first place. As we get older the decline starts at a low bar of functionality. Our analytical reasoning peaks at age 53. This is pretty disturbing when you first see this. We see aging as advanced aging and when we see an age of 53 as a peak with decline to follow – it can be disturbing. Investment skills decline around age 70. This might not be necessarily true for those adults who were financial professionals but if you made your own investment decisions over your life you might not find as much success in your investment efforts after you are 70. It is about the aging brain and the parts of the brain that are deteriorating.
Fluid intelligence: This type of intelligence is the ability to make decisions based on the information presented to you – not on past experience and education. Fluid intelligence deceases with aging.
On a bright note – crystallized intelligence is based on your life experience, your education, you career and environment. This type of intelligence increases as we get older. Many older adults depend on crystallized intelligence to make decisions.
Now that you have the inside track on how aging brains affect brain function, let’s get more specific about how these factors affect decision-making.
Longevity requires older adults to maintain strong decision-making capabilities for a greater number of years. High powered careers continue late in life. The average age for a CEO was shown to be 57-years old, with some of the oldest CEOs in their 70s and 80s. The minimum age to be president of the US is 35. But the ages of our politicians skew much older. Ronald Reagan was 69 when he was elected and Donald Trump is 70. You can not make a leap to conclusions about aging older adults in high powered positions because, even though everyone’s brain ages, how we take care of our brain will determine what kind of functioning brain we will have when we are older.
Good decision-making is a conscious and deliberate choice. It typically involves selecting an option that is most likely to meet our goals. Thinking through options and comparing all of the pros and cons require some level of cognitive effort. Remember that our speed of processing slows down as we age. This is likely due to the wear and tear of the white matter in the brain – the nerve cells that transmit information to the rest of our brain. This can mean that we, as older people, may struggle to make cognitively demanding decisions. Older adults have limited resources to deal with complex decisions and the greater quantity of information with which we are faced. What we do have and capitalize on is crystallized intelligence – our wisdom. We can determine if we have made a similar decision in the past and base a new decision on our previous experience.
There has been research in relation to decision-making in older adults. A study of adults age 65 and older found that they made inconsistent choices compared to younger individuals. “In the area of gain, the older participants took fewer risks than their younger peers. However, in the area of loss, the elders were more risk-seeking than their younger peers. Additionally, even older adults who met high criteria for mental well-being and mental health showed striking and costly inconsistencies in their choice behavior.” (Susan Scutti, September 30, 2013) The reasoning that researchers employed is that older participants suffer a seeming loss in cognitive ability to make rational choices, which is similar to other age related declines. With the data indicating that older adults make decisions detrimental to their well-being, it is incumbent upon researchers to understand how decision-making changes as a function of age across the human population.
Emotions play a role in decision-making. Our subconscious brain dictates 94-96 percent of our decisions – all below our level of awareness. This is the area of the brain that determines what we really want. We discover what our subconscious brain is communicating to us by what we feel. It is our gut-feeling, our intuition and our emotions. The subconscious brain rules our ultimate thinking process – it is not what we think and say but rather what we feel and want.
An understanding of how older adults make decisions is important for everything from healthcare choices to housing choices. We need to think differently about how we release information and gain a better understanding on how that information is received. Our society requires that older adults continue to make decisions even in the face of cognitive decline.
References:
Scutti, S. (September 30, 2013). Retrieved July 31, 2017 from http://www.medicaidaily.com/decision-making-ability-may-decline-age-are-older-adults-less-rational-258504
Wandi Bruine De Bruin. (June 19, 2016). How aging affects the way we make decisions. Retrieved August 15, 2017 from http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/how-ageing-affects-the-way-we-make-decisions-a7089906.html