🧓Too young for wrinkles? Governments and societies’ impact on individuals can be so severe that it leads to premature aging, according to a new study published in Nature, which included over 162k participants from 40 different countries. Although natural factors contribute to the increased rates of premature aging, such as high blood pressure and heart disease, other accelerators come from one’s surrounding environment.

The methodology: Following three years spent studying prior research to identify factors that either accelerated or slowed down the aging process, researchers fed their data into a machine learning model. The model was tasked to predict each individual’s chronological age, then compare that to their actual age, and calculate the difference between both numbers. For example, if a participant was 30 years old and the machine pegged them for 40, then that person would be considered to be experiencing accelerated aging.

The results are in: Participating African countries recorded the fastest aging rates, Asian and Latin American countries showed moderate rates, whereas European countries had the slowest aging rates.

As it turns out, social inequality is no bueno for your health. Factors such as social inequality, absence of democracy, and high rates of air pollution are linked to accelerated aging. Voting restrictions and an atmosphere of uncertainty have also been found to increase feelings of despair and frustration, which accelerates the aging process, according to the study’s lead researcher and director of the Latin America Institute for Brain Health, Agustín Ibáñez. Economic factors, such as declining national income rates and gender pay gaps, also come into play.

All roads lead to anxiety. Although the link between physical manifestations of aging and an individual’s socio-political status remains somewhat muddled, especially when considering a host of other variables such as smoking, genetics, and the like, high levels of stress and pressure — often caused by economic and social reasons — remain profoundly impactful on the body and mind, Ibáñez added.

Is there a fix? The study concluded that education — in its various forms — is one of the effective means in combatting accelerated aging. Other factors, such as the ability to perform routine tasks daily and engage in physical activities, also help protect against premature aging by maintaining cognitive abilities.

On the bright side, the machine learning model used in the study at times estimated that some participants were biologically younger than their actual age. Here, Ibáñez emphasizes the necessity of studying the common factors among these individuals to compile a list of best practices that may help avoid premature aging.

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