Want to live longer and healthier?
Researchers may have discovered a way to do it…
and it’s not all in your genes.
Want to live a longer and healthier life? Here are some things that might help you do it! First, let’s look at “centenarians.” A “centenarian” is someone who lives to be 100 years old or more. Researchers developed a questionnaire designed to identify certain genetically-based personality traits and used it to assess 243 Ashkenazi Jewish adults between 95 and 107 years of age. The investigators chose this population because their genetic similarity would make it easier to account for genetic differences in personality.
“The results indicated they had two things — a positive attitude for life, meaning they are optimistic, easygoing, extroverted, laughed more and [they] expressed emotions rather than bottling them up,” said Dr. Nil Barzilai, a study co-author and Director of the Albert Einstein College of Medicine’s Institute for Aging Research.
Other experts believe there is an interaction between personality and physiology, and it makes sense that being positive causes less stress which leads to a healthier life. In other words, some experts believe genes alone have less influence on our life span than most people think. Dr. Gary Small, Director of the UCLA Center on Aging said, “Several studies have found that genetics accounts for only about one-third of how long and well we live.” Read more from Dr. Small…
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