Lifetime of social ties adds up to healthy aging at molecular level
The cumulative effect of social advantages across a lifetime – from parental warmth in childhood to friendship, community engagement and religious support in adulthood – may slow the biological processes of aging itself. These social advantages appear to set back “epigenetic clocks” such that a person’s biological age, as measured by analyzing DNA methylation patterns, is younger than their chronological age. The research, which appeared in the October issue of the journal Brain, Behavior and I