Researchers have learned about the ability of the elderly to better recognize people's emotions

A new study from the University of Aberdeen has shown that older people, including the elderly, have a better understanding of emotions in real-life situations compared to young people. However, the result is changeable when the context is lost. This was reported on January 28 by Medical Xpress magazine.

Scientists say that the older generation can rely on their life experience to perceive social cues such as voice intonation and body language in addition to facial expressions.

"The ability to understand other people's emotions is the key to getting along with others and maintaining healthy relationships. This is closely related to our social well-being and can even affect our physical and mental health. For example, loneliness has a serious negative impact on health, especially in the elderly. That is why it is so important to understand how the ability to recognize emotions develops and changes over time," said Louise Lowry, a doctor from the Institute of Applied Health Sciences.

The study compared the abilities of older and younger participants to understand emotions by watching photos and videos of people interacting with each other. The study involved different age groups — from 17 to 26 and from 59 to 84 years old. They were shown excerpts of feature films and asked to choose the words that best reflect the emotions depicted in the scene.

According to the publication, older people tend to be better at understanding emotions in real-world situations when there is context, intonation, and body language. In such situations, the life experience of the elderly helps to interpret emotions more accurately.

Lowry emphasized that people often perceive aging as a process of deterioration (for example, memory loss). However, research shows that some abilities can improve with age, including recognizing other people's emotions.

"In everyday, real-life conversations, older people often understand the feelings of others just as well, or even better, than younger people. When there is intonation, body language, and context to draw on, the life experience of older people helps them recognize emotions more accurately. This means that interaction between age groups is usually most effective when there are more details and context," she concluded.

On January 28, Popular Science magazine reported an improvement in the cognitive functions of older people when communicating with their grandchildren. According to the publication, the grandparents who spent time with their grandchildren had the best results in tests of memory and verbal fluency. The lowest decline in cognitive function was observed in grandmothers who regularly took care of their grandchildren.

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