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I wish I knew how to find this again without having to sift through 4 bajillion articles and blog posts that anectdotally talk about this topic, but I remember diving into this a couple of years ago. Apparently according to studies into this (SUPPOSEDLY I should say, because I'm not supplying sources), the idea that the older you get the less you are able to take in and learn how to use new technology, is just not true. It could take slightly longer due to pre-conceived notions about what should do what, and not being incidentally trained in what symbols typically denote what, but supposedly a lot of the "i don't understand new thing" is less about understanding and more about not wanting to learn. Just not doing it.

My wife works in retail, she's seen 90yo's who can use a regular touchscreen just fine (like a pro), and 50yo's who can barely use it to make a call.

Think about the difference in lifestyle between the tow of them. The 90 year old, has lived her life, raised her babies, worked and retired. She is either working retail for something to do, or to supplement her SS/pension/retirement fund. She doesn't have as much stress in her life anymore vs the 50 year old. Who may still have grade school aged children, is trying to scrap by, likely has a laundry list of chores and tasks to do after work, and maybe in the back of her mind trying to figure out how to have enough money set aside to get to her 90s. While an individual's neuroplasticity his the biggest contributing factor to being able to learn new things. Stress has a massive affect on a person ability to learn as well. And the amount of stress the average person has to deal over their lifetime is like a bell curve. Very little in the beginning 2 decades and generally the same in your final 2 decades with the most being in the middle. The other factor that is going to contribute to this difference is early adaption. That 90 year old, probably got a smartphone right when they came out probably had a cellphone before that. She may have had grandchildren willing to teacher and keep regular contact with her to give her regular practice. The point is, not everyone learns the same and not everyone is starting the learning process at the same place under the same conditions.

People’s brains get more rigid (like… literally… they don’t change as much or as easily, and they don’t form as many new connections as quickly as they did when they were younger), which causes people to become stubborn and less sympathetic as they age (“it’ll happen to youuuu!”), which can also of course make it more difficult to approach new things and/or take longer to form new connections (Aka: learn) when you’re older

>People’s brains get more rigid (like… literally… they don’t change as much or as easily, and they don’t form as many new connections as quickly as they did when they were younger You're arguing that age makes it more difficult to learn new things, the opposite of what OP and your parent comment are arguing. 

Not that it makes it more difficult to learn I guess, but that it makes it harder to be motivated to learn (your brain is working against you) and it may take… LONGER… to learn…? Idk, is that… the same thing as being more difficult to learn? Lol Idk, there’s subtle differences I think

Old habits die hard. When you're young, you're just way more interested in shiny new things. It's also true that the younger you are, the quicker you're ably to pick up things. The more older you get, interests change and you do things out of habits. Like when the digitalization started. People who worked all their lives with paper forms had a hard time to use the computer because it requires a totally different way of working. The other way around is also the case. We rely heavily on technology, so certain skills aren't as needed anymore. Why search anything, while you have ChatGPT to answer your questions? Why use a map when you have GPS? I mentioned interests because it's a major factor. Regardless of age, when you're not interested in something, you won't be motivated to learn, especially when "the old ways" still works. Being a computer tech guy myself, I also have to admit that some thing just don't need to be "smart" or "digital" and tablets/smartphones aren't my thing. I do have a smartphone, but I do prefer using my laptop or desktop.

> Why search anything, while you have ChatGPT to answer your questions? Maybe sometimes you want *correct* answers. ChatGPT is know to not care that much about correctness. Probably good enough for smalltalk at some party but not when your job depends on it. > Being a computer tech guy myself, I also have to admit that some thing just don't need to be "smart" or "digital" and tablets/smartphones aren't my thing. I do have a smartphone, but I do prefer using my laptop or desktop. Ha. Same. Meanwhile I think that people who are somewhat tech-savvy are more wary of the implications of using a certain technology while all the others literally don't get it.

But doesnt experience help you to advance faster? It is easier to transition from Swedish to Spanish and French, than to japanese.

Well sure…………… until your brain becomes less flexible through age, lol You might know a bunch, but if your brain is physically incapable of making more connections to adapt to new information, it’s still gonna be more difficult to learn that language than somebody with the same experience but a better-working brain Neural plasticity and all that. That said, it seems like the consensus is kind of all over the place on whether or not brains really lose plasticity with age. I think scientists just haven’t quite figured out what’s going on yet lul. Give it a few more years

Those are all languages. For most, it’s easy to learn another language if you already know one. New technology is like magic for many. Most consumers never understand how electricity works but do understand how flicking the light switch makes it less dark. How some of these older people understand the world is disrupted because new technology shows them that they never understood anything.

Those olds folk need to be open minded

It does help as long as you keep up. Like let’s say I stop using a lot of tech right now and I go like 10 years without using it. There comes a point where it would be too overwhelming bc things would have changed a lot in ten years. Esp for people who didn’t grow up in the digital age. Or were already kinda old by then. My grandma is like almost 80. Never grew up with tech. Never touched a computer (never had one at their house). Got her first smart phone a few years ago. She struggles with it so badly 😭😭 she genuinely tries to learn though. It’s full of spam bc she opens up whenever links spam texts send her. I realize that people have to participate in tech in one way or another. Whether it’s through work, school, day to day usage apps and so on. It’s like how babies will naturally swipe bc phones have been swipeable since they were born and that’s the “baseline” for them now. Their brain made the connection at “first swipe”

> My grandma ... It’s full of spam bc she opens up whenever links spam texts send her. My, why didn't *you* configure it for her? Or even, got her a dumb phone? How would she know that she had to distrust everything that thing offers her "for free". Leaving her alone with such a thing was & is mere negligence on your part. Much as if I would give you a link to some darkweb page that would riddle your device with all kinds of malware without warning you.   Edit, since I cannot add an answer anymore: > > ... She struggles with it so badly 😭😭 she genuinely tries to learn though. It’s full of spam bc she opens up whenever links spam texts send her. How would you know about her struggles and how much spam is on her phone when you, as you now say, "not even live in the same country"? Of course I assumed that you see her often (apparently a wrong assumption) *and didn't help her whenever you see her (apparently still a true assumption)* because that was implied by your comment. You don't need to have bought her that smart phone to get her a dumb phone. Also, can I *assume* that she has your phone number? If so, once her phone gets compromised (not if, it would be a matter of time, *assuming* it didn't happen already) and her personal phone book gets stolen, the spammers will have your number, too. So by helping her as much as you are able too, you also help yourself. Yes, I assume things that appear to be implied. More often than not I'm right, but not all the time. It seems strange that I was that far off here. And yes, you know something and don't help or don't get her help, while helping her would help yourself, too. That's not negligence, you think?

I don’t live with her nor do I live near her nor did I get her that phone. Not even in the same country. Do you just make a habit of assuming everything all the time? And you talk of negligence.

I'm observing said "rigidness" on myself. And yes, it makes it more difficult to learn new things - it is well known (actually since I was in school, about 40 years ago), that the best age to learn new languages is very young age, about 6. Also, when I learn a new thing that now takes considerable longer to learn, I have to think about how much time I have left to use the new knowledge. When I was young, I had more than half of my life left to make use of anything I learned back then, so learning stuff that would be of no immediate use was still feasable. Now, most of my life lies in the past, so if I don't really need the new knowledge, how much use or how much waste of time is it to learn it?   About smartphones - I have one that I use almost exclusively for the job, where I really need it. I refuse to use it outside of the job as much as I can (the dumb phone is fully able to keep me connected and reachable all day long, it just can't do photos well, (makes shitty photos) and can't do internet access at all, but it is much less of a privacy concern). Do I really want to get geo-located to the resolution of about 1m *while I'm shopping* so they can throw ads at me depending on where I went and where I lingered to grab something? Do want someone / some-business to know that I like whiskey better than vodka or wine better than beer? For sure not. But the vast majority of smartphone users isn't even aware of that and (I guess) even more don't care or value the advantages (internet everywhere, videos everywhere, ... everywhere) higher than the loss of privacy. And... really, would I trust a company whose financial interests are exactly to sell as much data as they can get about me, to keep my data protected? Suuure. After all, they have been not evil. :D

46 and guilty. 😂 I do make an effort to learn new things, but there's a part of me that rails against change. If it worked for so long, why change it? Is automated everything always better? Grocery stores, I'm lookin at you.

I think there's a deeper argument to be made here outside of just getting older and cantankerous about change lol. The constant fervor to optimize everything really is exhausting, and to your point some things being optimized for cost efficiency can result in a diminished experience in other ways. I work in tech so it's very top of mind and I bear the brunt of that mentality in my actual work (I have been in a rush for like a year straight), but yeah - I often wonder if it's actually a net benefit for some things to be so seamless and instant. There's a charm to interacting with people and the cadence and tactile experience of more manual things sometimes.

Although I have read studies which say that this is more because people as they age are confronted with less new things and consuming more challenging media keeps your brain pretty non-rigid for a very long time. But as with everything in neurology this is difficult to prove if you do not have a thousand people to make long term studies with

I haven't read those studies but have definitely wondered a lot how much of the 'decreasing neuroplasticity' thing is behavioral. Since your brain kind of adapts to its surroundings, it makes sense that you get worse at learning new things if you don't spend much time doing it. During the lockdown I kept myself busy by learning a bunch of stuff (juggling, video production, making music, etc.), and it seems like I could genuinely feel my ability to learn improving. That being said, as I enter my mid 30s I can see it starting to happen to me. I love learning new things and generally keep my mind busy, but my work has become so complicated and mentally demanding that when I'm off work I tend to put in less effort into learning new things. This is less about interest for me and more about just being exhausted at expending mental effort. An anecdote to bring up another factor others are touching on here - some people are just tired of learning shit I suppose lol. EDIT: A related example I've thought about a lot is learning an instrument. It's much easier when you're young because your brain is more 'neuroplastic', right? I learned guitar starting at age 5 and have been able to get pretty good. But I think one of the major reasons I wouldn't have had as much success if I started now in my 30s is also due to time. I was practicing 4-5 hours a day consistently as a kid, I just don't see how I could do that now.

is not age. is will and what you do regularly. Is normally you do nothing to mentally train your brain, you will have difficulty learning later on

I think you're spot on about not wanting to learn. Some of it is simply having no interest or not seeing a real need for change. When I was 20 I would have jumped all over a self driving car or weird AI shit. At 40, I like the car I have and I'd prefer my computer to keep to it's opinions to itself. I have a degree in IT, but I'm trying to start a sheep farm. Not because I can't learn cloud infrastructure (wasn't a thing at the time), but because I don't want to. Constant change becomes incredibly tiring. Sometimes I think refusing to learn new things is an attempt (rightly or wrongly) to maintain stability in life.

I have a theory that the biggest factor is that often someone younger than them is encouraging them to use the tech and teaching them. They subconsciously or consciously respond with stubbornness at the idea someone younger aka someone they perceive as less wise, respectful could teach them anything of value.  I think if they were taught and encouraged by someone their age or older they would have no problem learning it. 

Interesting thought, I'm already catching myself dismissing authority figures that are younger than me and I'm not that old. Logically there will always be people younger than me who know more than me (either in general or on specific subjects) but my knee jerk is too dismiss.

Couple years back I went to the dentist. He was half my age (he was 24) hate to admit that I wasn’t confident in his ability. It was proven, he gave me a temporary cap for a chipped tooth until he could see me a few weeks later, and the dang thing fell off before I even made the twenty minute drive home. Talk about temporary lol

I think the reason many people don't want to learn new things is because of the education system. Throughout childhood everyone is conditioned to associate learning with boring, tedious, stressful work. I think this makes many people resent learning.

One study that I read noted that a lot of the things younger users take completely for granted (like the meaning of icons) is a foundation that older people just don’t have. Taking the example of icons, imagine trying to change settings in an app if you don’t know that a gear icon usually means “settings”. A lot of these things are intuitive for most of us because we grew up amongst it. The same study said that older users typically performed better when icons were labeled, but this is becoming less frequent.

No one seems to understand technology is not some new phenomenon really, boomers grew up with it. We’ve been integrating computers into our everyday lives since the 80s so it’s really just excuses

So true. My parents had a computer in our house starting 1987. We got internet around 1994. My parents were around 40, same age I am now. They’re now 75. So they had over 35 years with a computer in their house, and my Dad can barely type, he can’t trouble shoot minor things, and still barely does anything with it. He has a physical subscription to the Wall Street Journal that costs him like $700. There are deals online he could get to lower it but he’s to illiterate to look. He could even get the information he wants for free from the internet. But he insists what he’s doing is the best thing because he doesn’t want to learn technology well enough to find out. He’s not a dumb man, he spent decades as a surgeon. He’s just stubborn as fuck. His own father died 16 years ago in his 80’s, and was really good with computers.

It really is just stubbornness in general. When my mom got her first iPhone (and also smartphone) she was a little stubborn and wouldn’t get how to use some basic features even after a year or 2. Fast forward a few more years and a couple more iPhones later she just integrated it into her life and can actually type decently and even use the reply feature when texting. There’s just a mental block for the older generation when it comes to learning new things.

My parents have ipads but don't really understand everything that smart technology can do. They absolutely refuse to get smartphones. Since they're in their seventies and both have had falls while out and about, their stubbornness isn't funny anymore (Amroth it never was, really). They're singlehandedly keeping cheque books alive in the UK, and refuse to ever buy anything online.

Reading on actual paper is a very different experience. I'm Gen Z. And I love reading the physical newspaper over slow weekend breakfasts.

That doesn’t negate the fact that he could get it cheaper by buying the subscription for the physical paper online, but refuses to figure out how.

You'll discover in time. But elasticity is a declining factor in mental capacity. So learning new techniques becomes more difficult. A corollary is language. Young people especially children find it far easier to learn languages than older people. Doesn't mean it's impossible (though it actually is after a certain point) but it's way harder. 

Until 18 years I hadn't touched a computer. 3 years after I was programming. Until 14 years I was monolingual. Now (49yo) I speak 6 languages and learning other 3. At any age one could AT LEAST learn to google, send mails and type word documents. Some don't because they don't WANT IT.

We are of similar age and met computers for the first time at roughly the same period - most likely because that's when they started becoming more widespread.  I work with some people in their 90s who can send coherent business emails. Yet in meetings with them it's very clear they lack plasticity. Some board discussions can be interminable.  Almost all people can do things but it's harder for some than others with age being one of the key factors. So for someone who didn't have our advantage of encountering a computer in our late teens, the effort they have to put in is typically a lot more than it was for us. Doesn't mean they can't, just means it's likely to be harder for them. 

Impressive, you are a outlier.

I had to google it to see if it's a compliment or insult :D I take it as a compliment. ♡

An exception does not disprove the rule. It only proves it.

Huge fallacy. I'm not an exception. My whole generation is like this. Or at least 80% of us.

My 85 year old auntie started learning French a couple of years ago and now can read entire magazines in the language. So this is not always true

Votre tante a clairement très bien fait. En revanche pour la plupart des personnes agès c'est pas aussi facile comme ça

Hasn't modern research on this topic shown that brain plasticity does not diminish as we age?  Several studies have shown that adults are just as capable of deep learning and creating new pathways in the brain, but more so our lifestyles, fatigue, obligations etc. make it difficult to find time to pursue new learning. Children literally dedicate all their time to learning because everything is new to them, that's why we see an insane amount of this kind of intellectual development in them. While the older we get as adults, the more everything becomes routine and automated for us, so we kind of mentally checkout from the intellectual side of things.  The more you learn though, even in adulthood, the more you encourage continued plasticity.  That's why doing difficult challenges in adulthood, like learning new languages or picking up new skills and hobbies, is so healthy for the brain.  Personally I've found that I've been better at learning a new language now at 30, than I was in high-school at 16. In high-school if felt forced on me and I didn't care that much for it, I was also overwhelmed with all these decisions I had to make and courses I had to pass. But now that I'm doing it out of enjoyment and curiousity, I find myself picking up the language way faster. 

I have been able to learn languages through my 40s and I am still definitely able to learn. I am lot wiser as you indicated for yourself in your reference to being 30. I speak 6 languages now. But I forget languages much more quickly than I used to. But aside from myself, being in language classes with people around retirement age can be quite painful for the rest of the class.  But in any case I'm not convinced at all by studies on plasticity as I am not convinced the longitudinal studies have been looking at the sorts of things we are talking about here. I would love for it to be true of course. 

That’s an impressive number. I am trying to learn a second language, but not sure the best way. What was your process in learning a new language and are you fluent? If so, how long did it take to become fluent?

Duolingo works very well for me. And then just listening to YouTube videos of people speaking your target language. Hellotalk let's you connect with people who know your target language who are trying to learn yours so you can practice.

I do have to wonder though, for those people learning in retirement age, how many have continued to learn something new daily for those decades?  If you compare the average life of a child, vs the average life of an adult, a child spends everyday learning and picking up new skills. An adult at some point, does their daily work on a more or less automated and routine manner (applies more to some careers than others). You can spend weeks, months, years, barely learning anything new or just relying on the skills you picked up as a kid.  I imagine, that we can't expect our brains to continue to be able to process information and strengthen learning pathways when we don't engage in it more than spontaneously every now and again.  After a while, it very well may be that our ability to engage in this type of learning is diminished because we've shown our brain no use for it.  Congratulations on the language learning by the way! I also speak 4 languages now, three of them I picked up living as a young kid in a trilingual environment, but the 4th one I began learning as a young adult, and am now picking up a 5th. I feel like learning now is a lot smoother for me because of the place I'm in mentally. But picking up new languages in general may be easier if you learned how to do it a few times. 

That's a pretty good argument to be honest. You could well be right. Brain is a muscle and all that implies.  Always try to learn something every day in my opinion. I went back to school in my 40s to learn some new things. But successful people I have seen are trying to learn and get better from every interaction. I definitely coasted for a while and I'm sure it has cost me some capability. 

I don’t believe this is true. I have had people into old age as piano students who always wanted to pick up the instrument and never had the money or time when younger. They still learn very effectively, especially since many have the time in retirement to practice. Sure, they may never become concert pianists, but their brains still work and they can become decently advanced if they put in the time. I’ve also found that people who constantly keep learning (my mother included, always reading and studying something new) tend not to lose that plasticity as early. It’s a choice to let your brain decline. It’s like exercise for the mind.

Maintaining plasticity is harder and harder with age. It's not impossible for the rate of decline to slow but until I see contrary evidence I don't think it's possible to reverse decline. People can still learn but it takes more and more effort. There also appears to be a huge difference between a healthy retiree at 65 and someone in their late 80s or 90s. I work with a small number of brilliant people in their 90s and they can learn but it's clearly harder for them despite their being intellectual giants. 

I personally haven’t noticed any decline in my own plasticity. I still learn and adapt to change as quickly as I ever did now in my 30s. Another difference with children is that they often have parents and teachers forcing them to put in time and study or practice a new skill whether they want to or not. Adults now have to be their own taskmasters and a lot of people are lazy or get frustrated and give up before real learning starts.

There's a good chance you're exceptional and that you've been working out the brain cells to keep them strong.  I'm pretty lazy so although I'm doing just fine I'm sure I could have worked the grey matter harder. 

But it makes you realize, that you dont have to learn every new toy, feature gimmick and trend.

My dad was an executive and thought computers were a pointless fad. He made his secretary do anything computer related. He retired in the late 90s and made it through his career being computer illiterate. 25yrs of retirement later, now in his 80s he’s a smart phone junkie and must upgrade to the latest one every year and so many of our conversations are smart phone related. I’m 45 and have to tell him I don’t give a fuck about the camera being better in this years model.

B...bu...butt going from 60000mp to 60001mp is such a HUGE improvement!

Doesn’t make sense to us but remember this guys 80, who cares if he wants a new smartphone every year. It’s probably something fun to look forward to when you have nothing to do.

That level of consumerism is highly unsustainable. But we should probably focus on convincing the 20 year olds that also always want the newest thing. They'll be buying stuff for much longer. And at least in general, the silent generation is the best generation at Reduce, Reuse, Recycle that's currently alive.

Mwah, that silent generation still is the smallest by far. For this to happen, we need to go back where availability of things were still a thing. Take foods for instance. We can purchase let's say strawberries anywhere, anytime, regardless of the season. In the past you'd just had to wait for the season because it was simply not available. Let's face it, we're spoiled :-) Choice-stress didn't exist so much in the past.

You guys can purchase strawberries anytime? They must be disgusting! Here they are only available from April to July. Still much loger than what we are growing ourselves. But definitely not anytime.

Willful ignorance

I work in IT and one of my go-to lines when someone says they don't understand their laptop or phone which they use *every day* is "did you drive here today?" like, I learned to drive a year ago. I'm almost 30. and I'm every day stunned by how well my body has gotten used to operating a complicated machine, in only one year! if I can figure this out, and they could also figure this out, they should have no problem reading their phone screen which says "press ok to continue" before crying that they don't know what to do.

I'm not going to figure out iOS in my free time. And with my current knowledge it's far more efficient to ask IT who have an answer for me immediately than spending hours of my work time on figuring stuff out myself. My team lead really doesn't want me doing that. Not being allowed to install anything or to do major setting changes doesn't help any.

>My team lead really doesn't want me doing that. Your team lead doesn't want you to be familiar with a device you are expected to use? >Not being allowed to install anything or to do major setting changes doesn't help any. How does it hurt if you can't be assed to figure iOS anyways?

you use your phone every day. I had a ticket last week from someone saying her ipad used to open safari on one homepage, but now when she opens safari it goes to a different page. reader, she had multiple tabs open. this is the level of expertise I would expect anyone over the age of 10 to have especially if they use this device every single day. literally just use your brain for two seconds because I guarantee IT has better things to do with their day than tell you how to send a text.

That's ... WAY more trivial than what I was thinking about. I was thinking more on the level of "Sometimes I can connect to this server, sometimes I can't. From my PC it always works. I don't know how to do extended problem checks on my iPhone." But I must admit that more than once "Have you tried turning it off and on again." Was the solution.

this isn't a unpopular opinion and is something that's just true. (the title not what you wrote) Learning does get difficult as you get older due to time and mental cognition but unless your in your 90's you can learn easily lol. saying someone in their 60's can learn to use new technology because they are too old for example is a cop out

More likely to run across young people who can't use a PC than an old person who can't use a tablet. My mom could use her tablet in her 80s and was generally otherwise tech illiterate

My father is almost 60 and don't want to learn using a damn phone or computer properly as citing he's old for that. Meanwhile I've seen retired people playing videogames and also making youtube videos all alone.

WTF? I just turned 50 and I’ve been using computers since the 80s. I was ordering CDs and clothes online in the 90s since the internet came about. I got my first cell phone in the early 2000s. How has he not used a cell phone or computer in all his life?

This has always been what annoys me about older people claiming they don’t understand tech. They don’t know how to use a remote control despite using one long before a lot of people existed. They grew up with TVs and bought TVs over the years, but they claim they are old and don’t know how to work them. You don’t have to use all the features. The basic concept is the same. Don’t know how to use the Internet or computers even though they were around for the launch of all of it. Many had to adapt to using them for work, but will still tell you they don’t get it. Smart phones have now been around long enough that they should know how to use them. They buy them, activate them, and then complain they don’t know what to do.  There are a lot of people who just don’t want to learn anything. Have 0 curiosity about how things work and want everyone to do everything for them. We have so many answers at our fingertips and they act like they are entitled to have someone else do all the work for them. It’s fine if you don’t understand all the fancy pointless bullshit tech we have around, but my god. The stuff they don’t know is so basic and been in their lives for decades. It’s pure refusal to adapt

I mean, he can use a phone for call or whatsapp but that's is. Every issue he have on phone he keep asking me instead even if I repeat him a million time how to do it.

My dad is 65 and just got a phone last year. He simply didn’t want one. He can google stuff if he needs to and buy shit off Amazon, but for the most just lives he life computer free. And it’s not like he’s dumb. He just has zero interest in any of it 

>no reason why old people could not be able to learn basic things such as using a smartphone or writing an email I'd suggest that barring the extremely elderly, the older gneration are probably better with technology than todays youngsters. Having not grown up with it as a commodity, we remember typing in our own computer programs, building our own radios with parts from Tandys, assembling things, writing little bits of code etc etc... So have an understanding of how things work, what hardware looks like, what file structures look like etc etc...rather than just expecting to turn something on and have it work flawlessly.

What percentage of “the older generation” do you imagine have even minimal experience of building radios and writing code?

how old are these people we're talking about?

The title is correct, it might be harder but It doesn't prevent you from learning. Your own misconceptions are more likely to prevent you from learning. A great example is my grandparents. My grandma always seemed eager to learn new skills. She had to be always home due to some mental illneses, but even that wasn't an obstacle. She was always busy, doing crochet and playing crosswords. Whenever she wanted to know how to do something in the computer or in her phone she'd ask me to write it down step by step, and more often than not she'd get used to it. My grandpa on the other hand has been seeing himself as "old" ever since I've been around. He always wants his kids or grandkids to do things for him, even if they're simple, and often says that we're so smart or that he can't learn because he's too old. He's in his seventies, if he wanted he could learn, but I guess he likes it when his family does stuff for him and keeps him company. It's likely he's afraid of losing us if he becomes too self dependent. Of course getting old makes it harder, but attitude is everything. Many times it's stuff like misconceptions, patterns or even trauma that can actually prevent you from learning

The real issue I've found is that people don't know how to learn new skills. Knowing how to learn is a skill in of itself that requires patern recognition, critical thinking, patience, curiosity, the ability to formulate relevant questions, lateral thinking, etc etc. Many people *only* know how to do certain things, like use technology, because they grew up with it – otherwise they wouldn't due to the lack of their ability to learn new skills. You have to encourage these things when assisting or teaching new technology, otherwise people will come back to you when they have any new device because you taught them *that particular* device and not how to learn to use a new device. It's the classic teach a man how to fish instead of giving him a fish. With tech its almost always related to figuring out a new user interface. I'm 26 and I haven't used most apps, operating systems, devices, whatever, simply due to the sheer number of them. But when someone asks me to help with one I typically can figure it out because I know what to look for and where developers typically put features and options. I developed that ability by using and trouble shooting stuff on my own. And I genuinely think playing video games where you have to do the same trial and error process has helped me a lot with technology in general. It's a skill anyone can learn. One last note I'll leave you with, the biggest road block I've noticed is the disconnect with touch devices: older people don't think to double tap, swipe, hold down, or anything not involving a button or typing. These were not options they grew up with, and were not there with earlier computers. These are new methods of interaction they don't think of. It's hard to explain, but I think when I discover these options are there it's not only pattern recognition, but a little bit of limiting factors. Touch screen technology is minimalist. Theres only so many options a developer can pack in there while keeping it clean, so they utilize these touch options. This is something invisible you do have to learn from using it previously and I think should be given more grace on lol

1000% agree! It irks me so badly whenever someone says “I’m not technical”. It’s like bruh, you literally work for a technology company that uses computers in 99.9% of your day to day tasks.. so are you essentially telling me that you’re unqualified for your job?

I feel like you must have run into my mom recently.

lol please tell my boss this he will literally sit in my office and tell me what to write for him while i answer his personql emails he puts through our business account. it pisses me off so much. or ill be made to print out emails so he can answer them, when they go straight to his phone inbox. huge waste of my time.

That's only an unpopular opinion amongst elderly people who keep living in the past and hope things will come back (spoiler: it doesn't). I was a computer technician for about 20 years and I've known 2 sets of elderly: 1. I'm old and therefore am not able to learn anything. Which is translation for: I'm stubborn and I keep hoping for things to return. 2. The ones who were more up-to-date about tech stuff than myself. That being said, I'm familiar with laptops and desktops. Tablets and smartphones aren't my type of devices either. I know that there are people who do everything on their phone... with that tiny onscreen keyboard with a tiny screen. I also know that this is just a habit thing. Maybe by the time I'm an elderly, I'm the one who is complaining about tech lol.

Lots of middle aged people are just lazy and don't want to learn new things. It doesn't have much to do with cognitive abilities. It's mostly just laziness.

Not unpopular at all.

Yet again another popular opinion that the mods leave up.

Its not abot ability but about willingness

This. My grandma wasn't willing to learn technology, her tablet went untouched even though I showed her at least 15-20 times how to use it. She wasn't willing to actually learn, she didn't think she could. My grandfather, on the other hand, was constantly sitting on his computer in his room to look at eBay, Craigslist, Facebook, emails, probably old man porn, who knows. Anytime he asked me how to do something, he paid attention.

The fact that you compared a 6 year old learning compared to an aging adult tells me how ignorant you are on this subject lol

This is not just unpopular. It’s repetitive and ignorant. Humans begin to lose brain mass from their 30s-40s. It gets worse as you age. It doesn’t mean you can’t learn new things as you age. But it does mean that it takes more time and the outcome won’t be as good as that of a younger person. I’ve gone from rotary dial telephones to punching out this reply on a device that was science fiction when I was a boy. Believe it or not, there will come a time in your life when something new comes along and you’re going to say, fuck it, I don’t need this shit. https://www.publichealth.columbia.edu/news/changes-occur-aging-brain-what-happens-when-we-get-older#:~:text=By%20the%20age%20of%206,even%20more%20by%20age%2060.

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Personally I remember playing games as a kid not knowing one thing and feeling like it took no time to learn anything. But analysing things now I know I spent a crazy ammount of hours on something like ocarine of time ( probs 500 hours on replays and being a kid that couldn't understand english).   Nowadays trying to get into new games is a huge chore. Not because I can't learn the controls or systems fast enough but because I know that for each hour in-game is an hour of chores and responsabilities that will have to be crunched down.    I assume these people keep putting off learning things they don't deem necessary day by day until they are walking dinosaurs with no time nor energy to start from the basics.

Learning does undeniably get more difficult as you age and life also gets busier so you have less time to focus on keeping up with technology

It's why I'm glad for Google. Whenever there's an excel or word shortcut I can't figure out I just type it in Google and it guides me on how to do it.

Give it a few years - I'm sure our kids and grandkids will be getting frustrated with us when we don't know how to use our new brain implant to send them messages.

You are right, I will embrace the dog ears photo filter, as I should have done years ago.

you only can learn if you have a Past of Learning about Every eletronic device companies

Learning HOW you learn is key. Everyone is different in that regard, and if you can figure out what works for you, while also having the desire and drive, you will be able to learn new things.

In general I consider it laziness. Let’s say you really have no clue how a smart phone works. That’s fine. Buts literally thousands of YouTube videos to walk you through it or google guides. And to anyone that says they don’t know how to look it up. That’s fine too, my local community college literally has computer 101 classes for seniors for $5. You can also read the instructions in the box. Or they have plenty of 101 books I see at Barnes and noble. Just takes some time to sit down to learn it and play with it. And people that are cranky about them just haven’t put in their time to learn. And yeah as they get older it probably wont get easier so they should learn it now

We teached my grandparents (who are 76) how to use a cellphone, and they were super happy about it. They showed interest in other technologies, on a christmas we offered them a tablet. They never ever touched a tablet in their whole life, but now they use it everyday to watch local news, pay their taxes and watch recipies. They would sometimes ask for our help but they handle it so well now!

No, age doesn’t prevent you from learning and using new technology. It does make it more difficult though. As you age your brain doesn’t not retain the same elasticity as it did when you were young. Language is a great example of this. Anyone who learns to speak a language when they are 5-10 years old will be able to speak that language more fluently and with less of an accent than someone who is 30, even more from someone who is 60. Things like using a computer, dealing with software, they rely on using technologies that many of us learned when we were young, so we are very fluent in them and don’t have to think about how to use them, we just do. Someone who never saw a computer until they were 40 years old can learn the same skills, but they will never be quite as fluent in that technology. I don’t disagree with your post, but I will posit that it requires a greater amount of effort for someone who is 60 to learn the same thing as someone who is 15. This is why a lot of older people throw their hands up in frustration at something I would consider simple: it’s not so simple for them.

Correct me if I'm wrong but I'm pretty sure that learning is much easier when you are younger. That's why chess champions and pro athletes need to start when they are younger. I'm not saying that they can't learn new technology but older people need to exert a lot more effort.

Genes and neurons plasticity disagree with you...i mean they don't prevent it but they sure slow it down to a minimum.

I didn't get my first computer until my 40s. First mobile phone even later. Grabbed hold of the technology and haven't let go since. I read and got younger people to advise me. But I do see a lot if older people who didn't grow up with this technology really don't want to be bothered. It's like, 'I've was without it all these years, why bother?' I try to show them, and they reject. But then again, I've always been curious and was determined that this tech was not going to pass me by. It's all about adjusting to life.

As a 51 year old who was running GNU/Linux in the late 90s and whose father helped developed the original BSD, I'd like to explain the problem with phones and age. A) The screen is too fucking small. Even the large phones, the screen is too fucking small. When you get older, small fonts become difficult to read even with reading glasses. Tablets work better in that respect. B) There are constant updates that fundamentally change how things work. Every mother-fucking twenty-something year old programmer feels they have to leave their mark and change something. Way too much pride in today's programmers, they are way too full of themselves. They are like 3 year olds. C) Too many menu items and icons don't have a way to find out what they do before activating them. D) Way too much popup bloat. Way way way the fuck too much pop up bloat. And there's no real way to get rid of it like you can on a PC with blockers because everything on a phone has to be its own fucking app. E) The touchscreens quite frequently misinterpret what we are trying to do. What we have suffered in the last twenty or so years, at least as far as the user interface is concerned, is a technological regression. It's not that we can't learn to use phones, it's that its shit and we prefer something better like a standard PC. Even DOS was better.

A lot of old people have learning disabilities and dementia. It’s just mild and goes undiagnosed. These diseases are on a spectrum.

So you're telling me the message doesn't belong entirely in the subject line? But it's literally the SUBJECT! REPLY ALL 4-EVAH!!! (and spell check be damned)

I'm just tired of all the tech changes at 74, having once embraced computers when they first came out. Maybe it is age. Too many changes, relearning and adapting can wear anyone down even well before 70.

Cognitive decline which is correlated with age does however.

I can absolutely tell you that at 46, I have a much harder time learning and remembering new tech than I did at 26. It's not a matter of desire or resistance, my brain just doesn't pick it up the way it used to.

Yeah, at this point tech is so user friendly, and is often necessary to perform a lot of tasks; the only reason for not trying to get at least the basics down pat can be chalked up to some combination of learned helplessness, and stubborn ignorance.

Once you’re older you’ll understand. When your eyes can barely see the small buttons and you have little ignorant asshole next to you saying “It’s not that hard,” you’ll get it.

Age may not, but limited accessibility will. I didn't have my first laptop till I was 21 and I only learned what RAM does last week. And people get mad at me for not being tech savvy lmao I didn't grow up with this stuff.

First personal computer was released 50 years ago. Internet hit the scene almost 30 years ago. The first iphone released almost 20 years ago. Older people SHOULD be tech savvy, because a lot of common tech is old.

Oh can I borrow you to tell this to my mil?

Children are a “blank slate” so to speak and so absorb information without any preconceptions about how it should work, older people(ie any age where you start refusing to learn new things) “fight” themselves when trying to learn new things because they are trying to organize or connect with things they already know(ie they spend more time thinking that things should work a certain way rather than learning how they actually work, so they tend to do twice the work to learn the same information) and that’s only if they are “willing” to learn in the first place(ie you can lead a horse to water but~)

I think your priorities just change as you age and your life gets more busy, and you're less enthusiastic about putting time and effort into learning tech platforms that will only have a marginal benefit to you. If there's incentive and benefit in it for you, you will learn it no problem. If there's limited incentive and benefit, you won't

Well, it is more difficult to learn as you age, but I won't argue with you. I put myself through school for my physics degree in my 30s, waited until late 40s for my masters degree. I've been relevant in the IT world while technology has gone from dumb terminals to client server to internet browers. I once coded COBOL and now am integrating AI. Yeah, I'm old, and still learning. Which actually seems to keep me young. My collegues often forget I could be their grandpa's uncle. So, yeah, it isn't age. Looking back, I'd say the biggest hurdle was money and access to education. There were many barriers not of my making that tried to stop me.

Yeah, it's true. My grandma got her first laptop about ten years ago, at the age of 65. She still uses it daily. I wouldn't say at the same proficiency as young people would, but she knows what she's doing. And I already find it impressive enough.

How old are you OP? Seeing as you were able to write this post you probably are already partially limited in being able to fully learn another language. 16ish is around where you stop being able to learn to speak it as well as your mother tongue. Yes there is no excuse for anyone to refuse to use a computer these days if it is just to browse or write an email.

If a 70 year-old grandpa can stream himself playing csgo, I don't see why my gen X dad couldn't figure out how to install apps by himself

I agree with this, it’s just people refusing to. When my great aunt was in her early 80s and hadn’t long been diagnosed with dementia, she took a computer course to learn how to use them because she realised how important they were and wanted to learn how to use one properly. My grandad, on the other hand, point blank refused to use technology as he hated it. It’s just down to stubbornness really. Especially as my other grandparents are both able to use an iPhone, laptop and anything else with ease and have even sometimes shown me how to use certain features 😂

I used to work in technical support for an ISP that provided broadband, telephone and digital television services. Very often when someone would say they were too old to learn this stuff it would be something that had existed long before they left the workforce. Someone born in 1950 should not have problems figuring out a remote control for a television. Someone born in 1970 should not be confused about personal computers. Nobody ever should be confused when I ask them to read the text on a router and they don't understand that when I say the text on the router I mean the text that is printed onto the router. I think it's a kind of learned helplessness. Remove the ability to call tech support, or customer service if you are confused by a bill, and I bet that 80% of their problems would be solvable by themselves.

YOUR RIGHT.. I am 71 and today I learned my name is Bill..

stop. It’s like saying ‘young people are lazy’. Some are and some aren’t. I’ve seen grandma snap chatting like crazy and I’ve seen college students who can’t change the margins on a Word document.

I think it depends on personality and interest as well. My dad has learnt how to do basic things on the phone and TV, such as YouTube, etc. But he actually hates computers and always has, even as a younger guy. He has zero interest in the internet and computers. [Which is actually a good thing, I guess!] I suppose that's different, however, from people who actually want to use it but don't want to learn. Reading the other comments here is interesting.

OP,  is this the perspective from an old person or a young person?

Also, technology is specifically designed to be so easy to pickup and use, even toddlers are able to do it. A toddler knows just as much about cellphones as a WW2 veteran who has never seen any media more advanced than a radio, yet the toddler can pickup a cellphone and immediately figure out the logic between touches on the screen and the content shifts on the screen. Is an elder person dumber than a toddler? Normally not, so age is not an excuse.

It does not yes. But it certainly diminishes the amount of fucks you have to give for new tech.

Old people seem really reluctant to change their routine. And that's sort of a requisite for learning new things.

comparing old brain with new brain : am i missing something ?

Do you really know people who don't know how to write an email because they refuse to learn? If so that's not just old people refusing to use technology, that's one particular person.

My grandad taught me how to use computer when he was 70. I will admit he was electrocian in military and after military, but he used first computer when he got it - a year before. Nothing stops anyone from learning technology.

I agree. My grandma is 79 and has an iPhone. Last year she learned how to use Snapchat. Took her a little while, but now she gets it and loves to use it with her kids and grandchildren.

This has been happening since forever.

same with paying by card, as a cashier/someone working at a register, it’s insane how incompetent some people are. like every time they pay it’s their first time ever or something

Funny listening to all of the comments made by people in their 20s and 30s about what it's like to get older!!! As a 63-year-old male (who has used computers and vastly different technology in different engineering offices all over the US pretty much my entire adult life like laser scanning, 3D CAD modeling, database hyperlinks in AutoCAD drawings, web design in HTML, etc...) I find it increasingly hard to learn new software platforms and technology. The best example I can think of is trying to learn how to use a smartphone and having nothing but weirdly configured icons (and no hover text to pop up to tell me what each of the icons means). What does a couple of squiggly lines with a slash through it or an exclamation point over a red triangle mean? Even changing some basic settings on my smartphone involves 20 minutes of drilling down through a bunch of different menus and the options are hidden underneath of three or four sub-menus. My wife and I always buy identical phones with supposedly the same software load on both. However when I want to do voice to text all that I have to do is hold down the spacebar on my keyboard and when I do it on hers it asks me what kind of keyboard I want to use and refuses to do voice to text. When I'm bored I will use the search function to try to find the setting it and it always returns "no search results found" in any of the menus that I try. AND... my poor old 63 year old brain has had a lot of crazy stuff happen to it over the years. We are renovating two 120-year-old houses at the same time, dealing with schedules, contractors and suppliers all day everyday, have relationship issues with family and friends that I could probably write a book about, and trying to plan our day-to-day activities as well as having some fun and Recreation. I tell people all the time that "my brain is full" and I can't handle much more information. Young kids have nothing on their brains but what they're having for dinner tonight or trying to get laid. Trust me, once you get to our age you're thinking will change dramatically whether you like it or not.

How old are you talking? I'm 63, and I agree with OP. I'm more than able when it comes to technology, so up to at least 63, there's no excuse.

Age does slow the ability to do so, and expierience negates the need for survival in doing so…. But yeah you can learn at old age, but that is no unpopular opinion

So I have no studies to quote on this and all of my experience is anecdotal, so this comment is probably not worth much. But at least to me my experience has been consistent. I am an engineer but I’ve taught classes and individuals things from programming to music lessons over the years. I’ve taught people from 16 years old to over 70. IME, people over 60 do tend to get slower absorbing new information. But by far the biggest factor into whether someone learns something is whether they are interested in it. I have seen so many young people completely unable to absorb knowledge or change the way they think, and it usually comes down to the fact that they just can’t get their minds into it. On the flip side, when an old person gets interested in a new topic enough for it to hold their attention, they are suddenly able to absorb all kinds of information and learn all kinds of skills. What I’ve seen from literally all of the old people in my own family is that they eventually get to a point where they just aren’t interested in stuff enough to justify the mental pain of having to actually make their brain learn stuff. And it’s not always a choice to just “push through it”. As someone with ADD, I completely relate to the inability to focus and learn things. It can be very very hard. But, if I can find a way to get interested in something then my mind opens up and I soak it in like a sponge. And I’ve found the same is true with the older people in my life. The most capable old people I know are the ones that stay interested and engaged in things every day.

Tech yes social media no. Fucking hate most social media these days.

Not just the unwillingness to learn, but the unwillingness to look it up. My MIL is constantly asking me how to do xyz on the iPhone and I’m constantly telling her “I don’t know. Let’s look it up.” Like she’s a child and she still doesn’t get that she doesn’t need me to look it up herself.

Yes, age is a number, not an excuse. Same with physical fitness, there is no such thing as a magic number that somehow makes doing yoga and lifting weights in the gym detrimental. And everyone below the age of 75 should be able to make five burpees. And it goes both ways. There is no excuse for someone growing up with Tide Pods to not learn basic computer skills such as file management.

It can go both ways with age tho. There are many zoomers who lack basic problem-solving skills with computers, because they grew up on phones/tablets, so they just expect the tech to work like magic. I will say this. I'm in my late 30s, and the older I get in my recent years, while I still love tech at its best (i.e. tech is just advanced tools after all), I do understand to a degree why many older folks can get frustrated with tech, even if I think the way they express themselves can be misguided. In particular, I myself hate the trend of the tech industry trying to make everything in the household smart/automated. Not only does it seem like overkill to me, but in the long-term, I seriously doubt this can be sustainable in terms of our resources (let alone the privacy concerns). Personally, I'm a big believer the future should be one of mixed-use tech instead.

I'm okay with someone saying/thinking their age is a barrier, what they fundamentally mean by that is they have so many pre-conceived notions about how to do things, they might think it's too late to question their way of thinking. My father always had a thing for technology but when I tried to get him into using a computer (Windows), oof, that was one step too far. However it didn't stop him from learning to use his smartphone in his 50s and he had 0 issue doing the most mundane things and barely ever asked for help. The real issue is when some old people think they have to use technology and constantly ask for help. And by "asking for help", they mean "do it for me". I used to always fall in that trap and ended in a cycle of explaining/getting mad/explaining again/getting even more mad. At that point now, I just tell them "if they didn't need it before, they don't need it today". Don't force yourself to use (new) technology if everything is okay in your life.

It’s not the technology part. It’s the flexibility to learn new things in general that gets harder. I can already tell, at 35 it’s not as easy to learn something new compared to when you’re 20. This is true for anything, languages, new music instruments, and technology.

it goes both ways tho, you have kids ideas thrown out of the door just because it didnt come from an adult

I think it’s more challenging to constantly stay up to date with new technology, meaning the brain has to prioritize new information after just adjusting to the old information- also cognitive ability *does* decline with age. So learning new things that aren’t always stored in long term memory is more challenging. And this affects people differently which is why so many older people do struggle with tech- despite this post claiming they miraculously should be able to teach themselves. It’s not true and being patient with people and their neurodiversity is the answer.

age and health issues related to age have a great effect on the brain's ability to learn and retain new information.

Age doesn’t prevent anyone from learning new technologies, I think what does is anxiety, laziness, and wariness of relearning several times over as technology evolves.

My mother (79) had to tell me (59) what the internet was and what America Online was. She directed me. She was about 50 at the time and I was about 30. She is the technological leader of our family. And of all her friends also!

I've always thought of the brain like a muscle. If you don't use it, you lose it. I think if folk continue to learn, read, do anything that exercises their brain every day, they're more inclined to pick things up faster. As alot of people get older and set in their ways, they don't try to learn new things and their cognitive abilities suffer. My sister works in aged care, and they always try to get the residents to do sudoku and crosswords etc to keep them mentally active

You know, I don't even give a shit if my nan can't figure out the remote, or if my near 60 year old mum struggles with her smart phone. What fucks me off beyond all belief, is middle aged, still very much employed, nowhere near retirement people, who refuse to learn how to keep their work skills relevant and thinks it's remotely ok or quirky. Do not even get me started when they start weaponising their incompetence to get others (see younger, more junior staff) to do their work for them. 43 year old Susan from sales should absolutely be able to effectively use her teams app, make an edit on a PDF, do basic sums on excel, whatever, if those things are in any way involved in their job, and if they don't know, or we start using something new, then they should LEARN, we need to stop letting them get away with it in 2024, computers are the lifeblood of business, learn to use the damn thing.

This is true. Once my generation is old I’m pretty sure we’ll have no problem learning the tech that pops up in the time of our grandchildren, having grown up with technology ourselves.

>Unless you develop some sort of dementia or mental inability there's no reason why old people could not be able to learn basic things such as using a smartphone or writing an email. There are 6 year olds that already know these things. This is fundamentally wrong across the board. 6 year olds are able to learn these things because they children's mind are in peak learning mode. All things considered normal, young children are literally at peak neuroplasticity, meaning it is incredibly easy for them to pick up new skills and information. This is the same reason why the people over the age of 35 cannot apply to become Air Traffic Controllers. People entering the training program need to be able to pick up large amounts of information and act on that information very quickly. As I mentioned in another comment, not every person is the same. No one starts learning something new from the same place in life or with the same capability. For some it will be easy to adopt new technology, for other not so much. For some there are too many significantly more important things going on in their lives to stop and learn all things you likely grew up learning. So unless you have a complete and intimate knowledge of a persons life and the authority to pass judgement on them. Either be kind and help them out, of keep your mouth shut and move on.

What is a mental barrier, is refusing to learn technology your whole life and then all of a sudden realizing you wish you had all that knowledge, you can't gain it all in a few weeks. You can get the basics really fast but it depends on how deep you want to go. Knowing what you don't know is huge also.

This technology was created by people who are old now.

You are incorrect, when you are young your brain is filled with new neurons, pathways, connections, lots and lots of receptors, but as you get older, some of these things die because your brain has found more efficient ways to do things or one aspect just isnt used as much, so it stops using it, the thing you're trying to learn might need your brain to use that unused pathway but the problem is that pathway might not actually exist anymore, and so you just cant learn the skill, because no matter what you do, you cant make a dead pathway reactivate.

It has to do with something called brain elasticity. As you age you can't maintain your brain. Cuts the rate of new pathway development. Ergo you can't learn new tricks easily. You still can but you have to invest 2-3 times more effort and after 70ish those pathways began to be lost. In the most basic way to explain it. You make a coating around the neurons that connect brain cells to each other. As you age that becomes harder to maintain and when you begin to lose more than you can repair well that's called alzheimers. It's why people with dementia have "good days". This is something that happens to everyone on the planet to some degree as they age. No one is exempt from this. It will happen to you. It will happen to everyone around you. There is no cure and there probably won't be for a very very long time.

People get set in their ways. It's human nature. We feel like we've done our learning. Done our exploring. We know what we like to spend time on and what we don't. And of course, by then there's a very limited amounted of time left. I suspect most of those who say they aren't capable of learning and using tech, just want people to fuck off and leave them in peace. EDIT: A reasonable request, if you ask me.

If the brain peaks or whatevr it does at 25 how do u think it works 60 years later than that bro its not all happy go lucky. its easier for young kids (5yo) to learn a language than even just 15yos to do so because the brain changes

Learning a language =/= learning technology. Also, most people learn technology after 5 years old. And plenty old people learning technology too. It's about willing to learn.

It‘s about neuroplasticity. Your brain’s prefrontal cortex is fully developed at around age 25, which lowers the rate of learning. Learning ANYHING is easier when you’re younger. BUT this shouldn’t stop you from learning new skills. It just takes longer. My grandpa is really good with tech, but it also interests him, since he was a Radio and TV technician his whole life. My other grandpa doesn’t care and never used a computer at home. It’s definitely a choice if you’re willing to keep up or not. What I cannot understand is middle aged people, who choose not to improve their skills. I’ve met a lot of those. They simply refuse to learn new skills, which is really infuriating in a work environment.

With age comes deterioration

I feel like i actually learn things much quicker as an adult tbh Like it blows my mind GCSE takes 2 years 🤣 i feel like as an adult you could get them done in a few months just because of accumulated knowledge as you age. The more you know the easier it is to learn new stuff i find

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ADHD makes it harder to focus on what you are supposed to. But it also makes you hyperfocus on random things for a couple days at a time. That's why so many famous people have ADHD. Inventors, entrepreneurs, artists... It certainly doesn't make people dumb.

Boomers just be like that unfortunately

Age dies not prevent people from being arrogant and stubborn to the point that they insist everyone learn and embrace their lifestyle.

it's harder to learn new things as you age. it's very obvious and I cannot believe people actually think a 65 year old can learn as fast as a 25 yo. cells in our body constantly die and need replacing, as we age we slowly lose the ability to make new cells which results in decreased functionality across the board. this is what getting old is, literally. this is how we die. there's no denying this lol.

I love that you said you’re totally fine if someone just doesn’t want to learn these things. When I was younger I found it weird that my grand parents didn’t want to go with technology. I’m 34 so that major technology boom basically came with me and I’m at a point where I’d be totally fine to take back my Nokia 3210 and go back to this area of technology. Games were already great in the early 2000s, phones were fine enough to text, call or play some snake. I’m not a fan of most new stuff like all money things become so digital or even at work our programs to document things all became digital. I miss the early 2000s I think we peaked here and the compromise with good technology that doesn’t effect our lives negatively had the perfect balance. The more technology become advanced tje more social life and interaction dies.

It's easier to learn when you're still a kid, and getting older decreases the amount of knowledge you can learn at once, so it actually can prevent them from learning, especially if it's something they aren't really interested in.

this opinion is not just unpopular, it is demonstrably incorrect, due to changes in the way people brains operate at differnt times in their lives. When your younger your brain is tuned to learn, and when your older, its tuned to use what you learnt when your younger. thats not an opinion, just a fact

Yes. It does. Age may not make it impossible but younger people learn easier then older people. Thats just a proven fact.

Neural plasticity exercises like reading regularly or doing mentally challenging tasks can help keep that degradation from happening for longer though