Take a moment to think about where you are currently dwelling. Is it a rural area with lots of green landscape and stress? Or is it a city dwelling with high-rise buildings and tons of traffic? Does your neighborhood have a high crime rate or is it more peaceful and calm? Why are we asking these questions? Well you may not think where you reside has an impact on your health, but it really does.Research has now shown a close link between the neighborhood you live in and your aging. So if your goal is to live a long life you may want to consider moving… Your neighborhood affects your health Published on PLOS One, the new findings suggest the neighborhood someone lives in has an impact on their health. More precisely it speeds up the aging process. The research team at the University of Pittsburg School of Nursing focused on examining telomeres – stretches in DNA that determine aging.Aging is a result of telomeres becoming too short – they shorten each time a cell divides and cannot become copied. Shortening of telomeres can speed up with the onset of stress or depression.
Researchers examined the telomeres of 2,902 Dutch people. These individuals were part of a Netherlands Study of Depression and Anxiety. They had to report on their neighborhoods in context of fear of crime, noise levels and perceived neighborhood disorder.Researchers noticed the shortening of telomeres was more in those who had higher stress and greater perceived danger from their neighborhood. Furthermore, the length of their telomeres showed that between the group of high-stress and those who felt safe in their neighborhoods there was a chronological age disparity of 12 years. This means that although the participants were close in age, those faced with political, socio-economical and emotional stressors aged much quicker. Read more here
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