Elderly make math as easy as 1-2-3.

Past research has shown that, as people age, their minds operate more slowly, typically resulting in poorer performance relative to younger adults in mental tests. However, new studies at the University of Missouri-Columbia suggest the elderly actually can outperform younger adults in solving arithmetic problems.

"The bulk of research shows that mental speed decreases as we age, but our research [indicates that] this isn't entirely so," explains David Geary, professor of psychology. "In both addition and subtraction, elderly adults were slower at reading and speaking the numbers, but were just as fast as younger adults at remembering basic facts, such as five plus six equals 11. Moreover, when executing the borrowing procedure in subtraction, in which numbers are borrowed from one column for use in another - for instance, in solving the problem 32 minus seven - adults were twice as fast as college undergraduates. We suspect these results reflect differences in the early mathematics education of these individuals."

The results prove that many healthy elderly adults actually have better developed arithmetic skills than college students in terms of using more mature problem-solving strategies and speed of procedures. "Older adults had more rigorous training in basic math, with much more practice and higher standards of performance than later generations. Apparently, this rigorous training stayed with them - even into their 70s."

Geary and Peter Frensch, assistant professor of psychology, compared...