The 5th and 6th decades of human life have a bad reputation. From Terry and June to Homer Simpson, pop culture tells us middle age is a time of decline: of bad outfits, flab and woozy-minds. But what really happens in our middle years? David Bainbridge, science writer and evolutionary zoologist, searches for answers to these questions in his recent book, Middle Age: A Natural History. Excerpts from an interview:
How do you look at middle age?
It’s a complex, subtle, circumscribed biological phenomenon, on which we’ve grafted a wealth of cultural assumptions, superstition and folklore. Mostly, middle age emerges as the defining phase of human life—for the individual and the species.
Why do you think middle-aged humans are the most highly evolved?
The years between 40 and 60 actually represent a kind of sunlit upland of ‘maximal’ experience. Yes, we get fatter and slower, but our bodies stay in pretty good nick. If you get to 40, you’re likely to get to 60. What’s more, by the time we enter our fifth decade, we’ve developed cognitive capacities that allow us to think more cleverly.
Why do we groan, but want to string it out?
It is this extra phase of life that we’ve been given, for better or for worse. We have to be positive about it. Individuals who are in control of their personal life look forward to the liberation that middle age brings. They tend to go on and experience it much more positively.
Does it affect men and women differently?
Middle age is harder for women. It’s because changes in middle age affect what women think of as things that make them feminine much more than they affect things that men think of as masculine, due to reproductive strategies we’ve evolved with. Men have tended to seek young women with decades of reproductive potential, while women select men on their track record. So unfortunately, there is this asymmetry.