Growing older does NOT make you wiser, scientists claim

The great Irish poet Oscar Wilde once said: ‘With age comes wisdom’.

But new research suggests this may not be true – at least not in the real world.

Dr. Judith Glück, a psychologist at the University of Klagenfurt in Austria, has reviewed previous studies linking age to wisdom.

She concludes that “statistical relationships between wisdom and chronological age are not strong,” despite common assumptions and depictions in popular culture.

Whether it’s Gandalf from Lord of the Rings, Dumbledore enters Harry Potter or Obi-Wan Kenobi in Star Wars, wise characters in films are often hundreds of years old.

Although wisdom often comes with age, getting older is not enough to make you wiser, Dr. Glück emphasizes.

Popular culture portrays the wise old man or woman as wise, but the question of what exactly leads to wisdom is much more nuanced, her review suggests.

“Neither growing old nor gaining life experiences are enough to become wise,” says Dr. Glück in her article, published in Current opinion in psychology.

‘Although many people associate wisdom with old age, becoming wise clearly requires more than ‘just’ growing old.

Dr. Glück argues that there is “no universal trajectory of wisdom development” – in other words, people around the world do not just automatically become wise over time.

Rather than time, it is “life experiences” that result in the development of wisdom, but these are not unique to people of advanced age.

“Whether and how much individuals grow toward wisdom depends on individual constellations of life experiences and intra- and interpersonal resources,” she says.

‘Accumulated life experience is an important basis for wisdom, but not all very wise individuals are old and many old individuals are not particularly wise.’

The new study suggests that the saying “with age comes wisdom” isn’t true – at least not in the real world. Pictured is Dumbledore in Harry Potter, played by Richard Harris

The great Irish poet Oscar Wilde once said: ‘With age comes wisdom’ – but he also said: ‘Sometimes age comes alone’

How people think about life experiences and what they take away from them may be more important for the development of wisdom than the experiences themselves.

According to the review, characteristics of wisdom include compassion (being able to empathize with someone who is suffering) and ‘self-transcendence’, described as the ‘evaporation of personal boundaries’ in a spiritual sense.

Wisdom is also “a tool for dealing with challenges such as loneliness,” especially later in life, Dr. Glück said.

But wisdom can actually decline with age because “some of its components do,” such as the ability to understand complex problems or regulate emotions in stressful situations.

The role and relevance of tools such as openness, compassion and emotion regulation, which are necessary for wisdom, ‘may also change over the years’.

Granted, Oscar Wilde also said that “age sometimes comes alone” without wisdom, and the new review suggests this is more accurate.

Popular culture portrays the wise old man or woman as wise, but the question of what exactly leads to wisdom is much more nuanced (file photo)

Other experts have said that the adage “with age comes wisdom” is not true, despite society’s popular portrayal of the wise old man or woman.

For example, a study led by Dr. Carolyn Aldwin of Oregon State University shows that hardship leads to wisdom rather than old age.

So if you haven’t experienced hardship in your life, you are less likely to gain wisdom on the way to growing old.

However, several studies have suggested that age comes with wisdom; For example, a 2013 study from California University at Riverside found that older people exhibit more patience and better financial acumen.