Set In Our Ways: Why Change Is So Hard By Nikolas Westeroff

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Recommended: Human behavior with aging

The general pattern for people is that when they becoming older they are less able to vary life. Nikolas Westerhoff in his article “Set in Our ways: Why Change is So Hard” described the connection between humans’ brains and behavior during the certain periods of life. The key assumption is that in 20s people are more hazardous and tend to adventures, while after 30s this trend is less expressed. Author gives an example when the young generation can be even over risky and inconsiderate. The article includes the story about 22-year-old Cristopher McCandless, who gave his money for charity and hitchhiked around the USA and died in Alaska because of famine. When 40s – 60s are coming people lose their appetite for novelty due to the natural process, which reveal that old habits express themselves at those ages. The elder generation wants to feel stability continuing do customary things and taking care of their children or grandchildren. Also they are under the society’s pressure, when it is quite inappropriate being infantile or just make crazy travels instead of making a career and having a family. Author mentioned false hope syndrome, which means that people often procrastinate certain thinks that never be finished. That is why Westerhoff suggests doing everything “on a right time in a right place” because then it would be probably late. …show more content…

And genes for sure have strong meaning, but it is not a crucial fact, which made it impossible to change after 40s as author thinks. Our character is flexible and person can change own life in an opposite side at any age from changing appearance and way of lifestyle to work or living place. Everything just depend on the person’s efforts, his attitude to life and

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