this curious life

It's certainly comforting to think that aging benefits the mind, if not the body. But do we really get wiser with age?

'As Grossmann and his colleagues predicted, young and middle-aged Japanese participants showed higher wisdom scores than same-aged Americans for conflicts between groups. For conflicts between people, older

Japanese still scored higher than older Americans, though this cultural difference was much smaller than the difference observed between the younger adults.

Interestingly, while older age was associated with higher wisdom scores for the American participants, there was no such relationship for the Japanese participants.

These findings underscore the point that culture continues to be important for human development, even into old age. While wisdom may come with winters for Americans, the same may not be true for other cultures.'