People who look young for their age 'live longer' | Hacker News Reader

People who look young for their age 'live longer'

news.bbc.co.uk

42 pointsMikeCapone27 comments

It seems extremely plausible that whatever makes people look old also causes them to be old to some measurable degree.

I believe that's a fairly well-understood effect: the physical characteristics that we associate with 'age' are literally the visual symptoms of the body gradually falling into disrepair.

This study seems to go a bit deeper, testing whether this heuristic assessment of 'age' from the states of visible systems is a useful proxy for the 'age' of non-visible ones.

If there were no relationship, one would expect that apparent age would have no identifiable correlation with longevity.

Seems to me determining what systems are "visible" is a monumental task in and of itself, requiring the scientific combination a lot of fields that don't usually talk to each other too much.

When I was 29, I was penniless and in the military. I went to a travel agency decided to cheat about my age to get a discount in a plane ticket, so I could go home after many months.

I was advised to learn a fake birth date by heart, but I trusted too much my math ability and instead of 19, I actually implied that I was 17, so I paid an even cheaper ticket.

Looking younger has many advantages, but also some drawbacks. People tends not to take you seriously. Or maybe it's me.

You need more than math skills: http://www.hulu.com/watch/870/30-rock-twenty-nine#s-p31-sr-i...

Just take care you don't look like 50 once you're 40 -- and even young looking people can age quickly at that age. If this is an advantage or not, probably depends on whether it's discounts or, well, girls :-) you're after.

I personally find the article's conclusion rather tautological. Especially since with elderly people even a minor illness can make them look older within days.

Looking younger has many advantages, but also some drawbacks. People tends not to take you seriously. Or maybe it's me.

I don't think it's you. I'm 39 and I still get carded when I'm clean-shaven, which is one reason I wear a beard. Now, a lot of places have absurd policies ('we card if you look under 30') to avoid losing their alcohol sales license, but being told it's a compliment on my youthful looks gets old after a while.

Side note: after so many years of looking fresh-faced, I'm increasingly aware of actual changes in my looks and health as I age. I doubt this study corrects for the possibility of people who party their way into an early grave from a misplaced sense of personal immortality.

I am not sure how to take this - I get such varying age guesses. I am 31 and have been told that I don't look older than 21 (and that's usually the case - When clean shaven most people gauge me waay lower than 31).

On the flip side, there are times when I was 25-26 and girls I met would think I was in my 30's :(

I think context matters a whole lot. I'm 28. When I'm out with my parents, most people seem to assume I'm in college. When I'm out with older coworkers - folks in their 30s and 40s - most people tend to assume I'm in my late 20s (I never once got carded for alcohol at my old employer, because I'd go out for drinks with folks 10 years older than me). Most of my Google coworkers - who tend to average around 25 - think I'm roughly their age, although when I've gone out with them we get mistaken for college students a lot. I was mistaken for a Stanford student last time I caught the shuttle back from the airport, solo.

I still can't explain getting carded for Terminator 3 when I was 23, though. Particularly since I was out with a friend who was a couple years younger and didn't get carded, plus another friend who was much older (50s-ish) and had white hair. Even if I were under 17, it still wouldn't have been illegal, since I was seeing it with them.

Even if I were under 17, it still wouldn't have been illegal, since I was seeing it with them.

Just to be pedantic, it wouldn't be illegal to see the movie alone, either.

While I'm glad to read that kind of things (for looking young myself ;) ), I'm surprised that the study was limited to 70+ year-old twins.

It feels a bit specific to draw such large conclusions.

The fact that genetically identical twins can have such different apparent ages suggests a younger sample would be fraught with lifestyle variable problems. Even if you could record the data perfectly, trying to control for those variables would be a logistical nightmare.

I'd be interested to see deeper follow-ups with increasingly-younger samples, but the only scientific conclusion one can draw from this study is whether or not a hypothesized relationship between 'apparent' age and 'actual' age are trivially falsifiable. (apparently not)

That the marketing and press over-reach is a social failing; not a fault of the study.

Am I the only one here to whom this does not apply? :'(

I'm 21 and people are constantly surprised to hear I'm a day under 28. Perhaps it's the full beard or something, but I actually enjoy it - I spent the first 15 years of my life dying to be taken as seriously as I felt/thought and my age was always an obstacle in intellectual discussions or business matters.... so I for one am glad to be considered 7 to 10 years older!

It does apply to you in that you probably won't live as long as the rest of us. :)

Touché!!

More likely, it's just that someone's more likely to comment here if it gives them an opportunity to boast about looking young.

I predict that if you're still looking 7 years older than your age at 30, you won't be so happy about it :-).

Just the add something here. I used to look older than I was and part of that I put down to stessful, long-hours of work and eating bad food. I met a nutritionist who recommended that I only eat really healthy foods (no time to go into that right now!) as well as to try yoga. Since then I slowly changed my diet, do yoga a few times a week and meditate daily if possible. I'm often told that I look ten years younger now.

good news for me, I'm 26, and when I shave I look 18.

Same here (except I'm 27).

Several years ago, I was refused a job interview: the interviewer told me "we only hire people at least 16." I was 20 at the time!!

Didn't you have ID with proof of age?

I had a similar yet strangely opposite experience. I was able to get a job this summer after a lot of persistence on my part. Only after a week or so they bring out the paper work which I would need a parent to sign. They thought I was 13.

I get this, if I'm shaved I get ID'd in any liquor serving establishment on the planet, with a beard I've never been questioned. This worked amazing when I was legally under age as I started growing a beard at like 14.

I got pulled over when I was learning to drive, with my dad in the car, because the cop didn't think I was old enough to even have a learner's permit. Like, it was so far out of the realm of possibility, that he felt compelled to pull me over.

I have dozens of stories like this now.

It follows, then, that shaving will make you live longer...

correlation is not causation (joke)

Some people look younger but looks do catch up to age, at least it felt like that for me on my late 30's. And—I know he lives still—the idea of Michael J. Fox came to mind as counter-example.

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