Chapter 1: What does Professor Rose Ann Kenny say about aging?
The Clare Byrne Show on Newstalk with Aviva Insurance.
We all know that we're ageing, but how we age is something that is largely within our control. And my next guest says that the ages of 30, 50 and 70 are vital moments when it comes to how we will age. Let's find out more with Professor Roseanne Kenny, who's head of the Ageing Research Programme at Trinity College Dublin and is with me here in the studio. Hello. Hello, how are you?
Lovely to see you. Thank you. So the numbers as we see them going up, we can't do anything about that, right? We are going to age every year. That's inevitable. But how it happens, a lot of that is within our control. A lot of that is within our control. This is a very active research area at the moment.
In the last couple of decades, it's just escalated because a lot of very wealthy people have a vested interest in understanding it and they hope modifying it.
Chapter 2: Why are the ages of 30, 50, and 70 crucial for aging?
So what we've learned latterly is that the process isn't linear. That means it's not occurring gradually at the same rate from the day we're born until the day we exit. Rather, it's much more like a stairs. And every so often in the stairs, at three time points probably, there's an accelerated ageing. And that's roughly, and it varies from person to person, but roughly age 30, 50 and 70.
It's a bit depressing, isn't it? Well, I think it's important to know because they're the stages that we should be aware of and you can do something about it. And that's what we'll come on to, I expect. But, you know, this isn't all not in our control. About 20 to 30 percent, our genes are dictating and we can do nothing about that at the moment. But the 70%, that's like two thirds of it.
We can absolutely control or at least modify significantly. And that is a lot. So what is happening at those stages then? 30, 50, 70? We don't know why it's happening. That's the first thing. Certainly hormones are involved in women around 50, et cetera, and possibly 30 also. But we don't know what the trigger is.
We don't know what the key is that's unlocking that and causing that acceleration of the aging process. But we do know, if you look at the cells, that you can see a speeding up of inflammation in cells, for example. Inflammation is probably the key common pathway that leads to cells getting more sluggish and ultimately dying, which is what aging is about. Now, we all know about eating well.
We know about exercising and we should step up our exercise as we get older, not pull it back, which is sometimes the temptation, I think. Yeah. But the socialising part seems to come out on top all of the time when you look at this research.
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Chapter 3: What role do genes play in the aging process?
Yeah, it does. It's very, very important. And actually, I was doing a paper yesterday with someone on the flip side of that. So the quality of your social relationships and the quality of social engagement is very, very important. And the flip of that is, of course, loneliness.
But then if you look into the quality of your relationships, and this is particularly so in the work environment, if you are experiencing a hassling relationship, that accelerates biological ageing. It's very bad for us if we measure the biology of people experiencing hasslers, but also then their health... They get health problems earlier if it's persistent hassling. Isn't that fascinating?
It is fascinating. And it's really, really important, I think, for the work environment. We were doing work in the context of how do we make the work environment better for health? This was one of the things that came out on top. It's intuitive. We know that if somebody's bothering you, you get sick. It puts you under stress. But anyway, so there's good now biological evidence for that.
And it applies also to family members, right? So, you know, we don't always get on with everybody in the family. Sometimes it's easier with friends because you pick your friends. You're stuck with the family. Now, this bit I don't understand. We didn't show that husbands made a difference. Or not husbands. I'm saying husbands obviously because it applies to me. That's a slip of the tongue.
But our partner, hassle from the partner didn't seem to have a negative influence. Oh, we can ignore that. Surprise.
Surprise.
What about the people who are just quite happy in their own company? Oh, no, that's fine then. Is that fine? Absolutely, of course. Let them off. And so we we we different people require different degrees of engagement with others.
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Chapter 4: How can lifestyle choices impact our aging?
There are some who cannot be without somebody all of the time. And, you know, they get there. They need lots of ducks in a row and lots of different ducks. And then there are others who are very happy in their own company, and that's fine. You know, it's how you are internally that matters.
Very, very few people can be alone all of the time and not need someone because we haven't evolved like that. We've evolved to be part of a tribe and to have a function in the tribe, which is why I come on to purpose in all of that because purpose is very closely bound with social engagement. Yes. The purpose is really important for some people that will come from their work.
It will come from their family. But I'm just sensing, listening to you, there must be a real danger time around retirement here. Yeah. So retirement can go one of two ways. For some people, it's an absolute godsend. They're very happy. They have a happy retirement, a good retirement. For others, you've completely taken the rug out of their lives because that was their social network.
That was their purpose. They're the two big things. And suddenly they no longer have it. And, you know, I think many countries now are looking at this and saying, well, it doesn't make any sense to retire, as was previously the case at 65, 66, because we know biologically we're getting younger all of the time. And, you know, it actually probably doesn't make any biological sense.
But it may be that we don't want to be doing the same thing at 65 as we were doing at 25. Yes, because I'm sure we'll have people listening to this going, I'm absolutely sick of battling the traffic and getting into that office for nine o'clock in the morning. I can't wait to retire. Yes. So you're saying you don't have to do that when you're 70, but do some other kind of work, maybe.
Well, certainly from a societal perspective and a workplace perspective, I think we need to start thinking at a societal level. Should there be compulsory retirement? Should people have a choice? And should we be modifying the work environment to hostility?
harness the fantastic institutional memory and learnings of people who have spent 40 years doing something but but but you know in in in a way that their job was is is more is enjoyable at every stage of life um and then if you are retired or retiring you have to find something You'll know yourself that, you know, getting up in the morning, I don't feel I have anything to do. I hate that.
Well, then you have to make something to do. Purpose is very, very important. Purpose is one of the keys here. Absolutely. Can we come back to the exercise? Because again, when you get to, you know, 50, 55, 60, you've got a few aches and pains and you want us to swing out of things and lift heavy weights and run, I assume, or walk very fast. It can be a big ask sometimes, can't it?
How do we convince people that it's the right thing to do to up the exercise? So the first thing I would say is get it into one's head that after the age of 50, every year, year on year, you do a little bit more, not less. That's the first thing. And that's not impossible.
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