Not elder law: Glad to know it’s not just me!
Exploring the anatomy of attention, researchers have discovered that middle-aged people are more readily driven to distraction by interruptions because of age-related changes in how their brains work.
In research made public today, scientists at the University of Toronto and the Rotman Research Institute documented for the first time how age altered the brain’s ability to ignore irrelevant intrusions.
“I have certainly found that as I have gotten older it is harder to deal with distractions,” said lead author Cheryl L. Grady, 52, who studies the cognitive effects of aging. “This experiment tells me why that is. This is happening in my brain.”
By scanning the brains of healthy young, middle-aged and elderly people, Grady and her colleagues detected a gradual breakdown in the brain circuits that maintain the normal balance of the attention span.
Two key regions of the brain that allow the mind to focus on a single task and tune out unwanted thoughts get out of kilter much earlier in life than previously suspected.
Normally, special neural circuits in the prefrontal cortex become more active when the mind pays strict attention.
At the same time, related brain areas in the medial frontal lobe — thought to monitor more general background activity — simultaneously slack off.