Turn Back the Clock

What if it is possible to simply think yourself young again? Years ago, Harvard psychologist Dr Ellen Langer made this extraordinary claim. Forty years later, Channel NewsAsia restaged Langer’s landmark experiment for the first time in Asia. Five well established Singaporeans, all in their 70s and 80s, spend a week living together, as though they were back in their heyday in 1977. They will live, talk and exercise like they are still in their prime. A panel of experts carried out a battery of tests on the volunteers. From memory to balance, flexibility to walking speed, the same tests were conducted a week later. Miraculously, all the participants fared better, both physically and psychologically. Was it just about living life in the past, or was there more to it that led to a noticeable improvement in their well-being? How did those seven days change the rest of their lives?