Description: Which is more stressful, catastrophic life events or daily stresses (hassles)? One on one, of course catastrophic life events are more stressful but which stressors, all in all, take more of a toll on us physically and psychologically? Classic stress research by Richard Lazarus found that in the long run daily stresses or hassles… Read more »
Posts Categorized: Health and Prevention In Aging
SuperAgers: Born or Made?
Description: Do you have an aging relative who is still remarkably sharp mentally, who can remember details of many things, is quick to respond to comments with humour and insight and who, from a mental point of view seems much younger than their years? Well, if so, there is a name for that sort of… Read more »
Sence of Purpose = Longer Life: Advice for Living Well
Description: Based on what you know or on what you think is likely to be true name some things adults can or should do to increase their lifespan. I bet things like eating well, regular exercise and moderation in things like alcohol intake are on your list. But what about psychological (cognitive things)? I don’t… Read more »
Walking and Dementia
Description: Dementia associated with aging is a serious concern. Dementia is a general term for impairments in memory, thinking, and decision making in ways that can interfere with everyday activities. It can be related in injury, Alzheimer’s disease, changes in blood flow with age and any number of other issues. There are some treatments that… Read more »
Forest Bathing: Follow the Data or the Money?
Description: I am willing to bet that you have already heard something about the practice of if not the term being used for forest bathing. No, it does not involve getting wet in the woods (unless perhaps it is raining). The term comes out of Japan (shinrin yoku = forest bathing) where the practice of… Read more »
Aging Attitudes, Aging Health and Ikigai
Description: Quick question! How are attitudes towards aging and aging related health related? I am guessing but I suspect your answer to that question was something like; they are related in that as your health declines your attitudes about aging become more negative. That does seem to make sense. Those of us in our late… Read more »
Vaccine Hesitancy 201
Description: We are all very tired of talking about and worrying about Covid and its many issues and yet we are also, as I write this, wondering what the Omicron variation is going to do to our ability to cope and manage individually, withing our communities and especially within our medical systems. Any sort of… Read more »
Psychiatric Disorders and Type 2 Diabetes: How are they related?
Description: Read just the title of the article linked below. Now, what questions or hypotheses pop up for you with just the title in mind? If you have had a psychology or a statistics course you will recognize the title as a typical example of a statement of correlation. Psychiatric disorders and type 2 diabetes,… Read more »
Psychology of Covid: The Vaccine Dilemma Game
Description: Social psychology often involves examining the social give and take between individuals and at some of the ways that individuals may bias their perceptions or out and out act in their own interest at the expense of other’s outcomes. This work includes things like the Just World Hypothesis (e.g., maybe people who flaunt social… Read more »
Reactivating Stem Cells: Possbile Key to Treating Neurodegenerative Disorders
Description: When I first started teaching introductory psychology a few decades ago I used to tell students that they had most of the largest number of brain neurons they would ever have at the time they were born. After their birth the number of brain cells dropped due to things like attrition and pruning (neurons… Read more »