New ageing research website now up and running
9 February 2009
The HALCyon (Healthy Ageing across the Life Course) collaborative research programme will help improve the lives of older people through a better understanding of how healthy ageing is affected by social, psychological and biological factors acting across the whole of a person’s life. The programme has now launched its website – a new resource for the research community and the public.
HALCyon brings together an interdisciplinary group of scientists working on nine UK cohort studies. Cohort studies involve groups of people who share a common characteristic or experience (e.g. are born in the same period) for a period of time. Birth cohort studies will follow large populations from the cradle to the grave.
HALCyon aims to maximise the potential of the data collected across all of these studies to understand three aspects of healthy ageing:
- physical and cognitive capability: the ability to undertake the physical and intellectual tasks of everyday living
- psychological and social wellbeing, including the positive emotions that people feel and how they function in terms of relationships and social activities
- and the underlying biology of ageing, including cortisol, one of the body's stress hormones, telomere length (the cell's natural clock that tells the body how old it is) and genetic factors.
HALCyon supports eight projects investigating how individual factors such as early development, lifetime health, personality and nutrition, and characteristics of areas in which study members have lived influence these indicators of healthy ageing. These factors may explain how some older people come to live full and active lives and why differences exist between men and women, or between social groups. Some cohort members will be interviewed to find out how they understand their life history and experiences and their response to ageing.
Interactions between the scientists and experts in policy, practice and user involvement will ensure that the new knowledge gained will improve the lives of older people.
HALCyon is funded by the New Dynamics of Ageing, a cross research council research initiative. To find out more, please click here.
Phone: 0207 670 5139
press.office@headoffice.mrc.ac.uk
