@thedraketeam

What’s the best thing in being 101 years old? The absence of peer pressure, said a 101 year old woman. Some people maintain their sense of humour and enjoyment of life into old age.

They’ve looked into the research around ageing and the brain – not neural pathways but mindsets. What did they find out?

We get more anti-social as older. People get more nervous of crowds as they get older. Shared experience is very important to the young. But over 35% of 65+ people still enjoy crowds. But it does show that by the late teens or early 20s some people are “getting old” – starting to dislike crowds. There are old brains and new brains – young brains like fun, change, reinvention. Old brains like a comfort zone of misery: “they’re a pain in the arse”.

There are six wisdoms of today’s youth:

• Openness to change
• Being open to people
• Action-orientation
• Having fun
• Being positive and designing tomorrow
• Looking after yourself, then others

Gen Y are diversity blind – gay/straight, black/white. Doesn’t matter. Young people are better at collaborating – the old brains think that’s cheating. They prefer leadership to management. Management is about control and hierarchy. Leadership is forward-looking, and about encouraging people to identify with the vision.

Obviously, everyone here has a young brain