Breaking the Age Code: How Your Beliefs About Ageing Determine How Long and Well You Live

According to the World Health Organisation (WHO) ageism is the most widespread and socially accepted prejudice today. Dr Becca Levy, Yale Professor and pioneer in the field of later life studies, sets out to further our understanding of the complicated subject of ageing.Levy succeeds in challenging stereotypes: “mental illness is much less common in older than in younger adults and most older persons with mental illness can be successfully treated,” offering persuasive evidence to show that in later life we grow in emotional intelligence.The central theme here is ‘Age Beliefs’, simply put this is about challenging the conventional perception of what it is to be old. Levy maintains negative age beliefs are not only a barrier to good mental health, they are ingrained within society. Looking in detail at our own inbuilt prejudices and cultural stereotyping, Levy successfully argues against assumptions that ageing is purely a degenerative process, pointing out the positive attitude to ageing in Japan; a country with the world’s longest healthy lifespans.One of the most engrossing chapters is ‘Later Life Mental Health Growth.’ A real eye opener; it boldly challenges the assumption that lethargy and depression are standard features of normal ageing. Founder of psychoanalysis Sigmund Freud comes in for criticism for his attitude to older patients, yet Levy believes structural ageism in the field of mental health care, like our own individual negative age beliefs is reversable.Meticulously researched and packed with surprising insights, Breaking The Age Code isn’t some dusty intellectual textbook, it’s highly readable, entertaining and enlightening from cover to cover.Above all, this is a book about ageing as positive human development. It will completely change the way you look at later life.

In this relatively short book, Dr Becca Levy covers a lot of ground. She looks at both why and how having a positive attitude to ageing can help us to live longer and more fulfilling lives, and how negative societal attitudes to ageing can make this harder, particularly in western societies. And then goes on to suggest an ABC process (awareness, blame and challenge) to push back on ageist comments and attitudes (whether deliberate or accidental).I found it so interesting and inspirational that I keep suggesting to friends and colleagues they read it too!

Dr Levy makes a couple of points - if we think we're old then we act old, and Western social and cultural norms encourage this - in her opening chapter and repeats them for 300 pages. Her thesis is thought provoking and is clearly based on a lifetime of study in the field, so this book has merits but I don't feel that it lives up to the hype.Plus, she omits to mention the impact of degenerative conditions on physical and mental health which no amount of anti ageist education can ameliorate.For me, the cosy chatty tone which I associate with a certain type of American self help books grated after a while. Introducing an expert's contribution by telling readers that he lives in a sprawling Victorian home is not necessary. Nor is telling us that Zimbabwe is a country in south central Africa.