The resilient self: How the aging brain compensates to keep "you" a priority
While cognitive aging often brings decline, the brain’s ability to prioritize self-related information remains remarkably intact. A study combining computational modeling and fMRI shows that older adults preserve, and even enhance, self-prioritization compared to younger adults. Although older adults respond more slowly due to cautious decision-making, the core computational process of accumulating evidence for self-relevant stimuli is unaffected. Neuroimaging reveals this is supported by a dual mechanism: age-invariant self-other discrimination in posterior brain regions and compensatory, heightened recruitment of prefrontal and temporal areas specifically in older adults to sustain behavioral performance.
Why it might matter to you: This research provides a concrete neural model for how specific cognitive functions can be preserved through compensatory recruitment, a concept central to understanding cognitive resilience. For theories of brain maintenance, it demonstrates that preservation isn’t a passive lack of decline but an active reconfiguration of network engagement. This mechanistic insight into successful aging could inform future interventions aimed at bolstering cognitive reserve and self-referential processing.