Slow it Down

Article Tools

Contact The Editor Articles By This Author

Here's an interesting little fact about growing older; time accelerates. My wife and I are forever lamenting the speed in which the days, the weeks, the months fly by. "Where did the day go?" "Can you believe that tomorrow is Friday again?" "What happened to winter? How did we get to spring so soon?"

And no, this is not only occurring at our house. Ask anyone past the age of say, 60 or 65 and they will agree that time goes by too fast. My sister has said for years that as soon as you get to Rosh Hashana, the next thing you know it's the middle of January. The seasons are much shorter than when we were kids, no doubt about it. Is this really happening or is it just an old person thing? Is it a minor form of early dementia?

According to a scientific paper published a few years ago, Professor Adrian Bejan presents an argument based on the physics of neural signal processing. He hypothesizes that, over time, the rate at which we process visual information slows down, and this is what makes time 'speed up' as we grow older.

He claims that as we age, the size and complexity of the networks of neurons in our brains increases — electrical signals must traverse greater distances and thus signal processing takes more time. Not only that, but ageing causes our nerves to accumulate damage that provides resistance to the flow of electric signals, further slowing processing time.

Focusing on visual perception, Bejan says that slower processing times result in us perceiving fewer 'frames-per-second' — more actual time passes between the perception of each new mental image. This is what leads to time passing more rapidly. When we are young, each second of actual time is packed with many more mental images. Like a slow-motion camera that captures thousands of images per second, time appears to pass more slowly.

"People are often amazed at how much they remember from days that seemed to last forever in their youth," he says. "It's not that their experiences were much deeper or more meaningful, it's just that they were being processed in rapid fire."

But other experts offer other explanations for this phenomena. Cindy Lustig, a professor of psychology at the University of Michigan says, "Our perception of days, weeks, years and that kind of time seems to be especially influenced by our perspective: Are we in the moment experiencing it, or are we looking backward on time?"

She added that the perception of time is also influenced by memory and how much you've experienced. For an 8-year-old, a week is a big portion of their life. For an 80-year-old, a week is a much smaller portion of their life, which contributes to the feeling that it went by quickly.

Another idea is that there is a gradual alteration of our internal biological clocks. The slowing of our metabolism as we get older matches the slowing of our heartbeat and our breathing. Children's biological pacemakers beat more quickly, meaning that they experience more biological markers (heartbeats, breaths) in a fixed period of time, making it feel like more time has passed.

Whatever the explanation is, you can't deny that as you get older time seems to be zooming by. Of course we realize that the older we get, the closer we get to death. Maybe subconsciously our brains are saying to us, "No, we are not ready to leave this life yet! Slow down!"

They say that time flies when you're having fun. Does that mean that senior citizens are having more fun than kids? Oh, sure. Getting old is hilarious.

Well, I can't believe I'm just about finished with this column. My, my! Time certainly does fly!

(COMMENT, BELOW)