Young People Actually Look Older From Stress, Study Finds

It's not just in your head—stress really can make you look and feel older, even in your 20s. But, according to new research, these effects might only be seen on days when people feel out of control of their own lives.

More than a quarter of U.S. adults report feeling too stressed to function most days, according to a poll conducted by the American Psychological Association in 2022. Such chronic stress levels can have wide ranging repercussions for both our mental and physical wellbeing, including anxiety, depression, cardiovascular disease, asthma and diabetes. Stress can also lead to chronic fatigue, obesity, digestive issues and immune system disorders, which collectively can add up to make us feel older than we actually are.

"There's substantial research that tells us stress makes older adults feel their age, or even feel older than they actually are," Shevaun Neupert, a professor of psychology at North Carolina State University, said in a statement. "And the literature tells us that when seniors feel older than they actually are, that is associated with a host of negative health outcomes.

"However, there is little research examining this issue in younger adults—people in their teens, 20s and 30s. Having a deeper understanding of this phenomenon across all age groups could help us develop interventions that protect our mental and physical well-being."

In a study published in the journal Mental Health Science, Neupert and colleagues collected data from 107 young adults between the ages of 18 and 36. The participants were monitored for eight days to determine the levels of stress they were experiencing each day, how old they felt and looked on that day, and how much control they felt they had over their own lives.

"The key finding was that on days when study participants reported experiencing higher levels of stress than they normally did, they also reported looking and feeling older," Neupert said. "However, this was only true on days when study participants also reported feeling that they had less control over their lives than they normally did."

While these results were subjective, previous research has shown that subjective age can significantly affect our subjective wellbeing, cognitive performance, and reduce depressive symptoms. The results also show that feeling in control of your own life can counteract some of the negative impacts of daily stressors.

"This work may be particularly timely, as stress researchers are seeing an increase in the amount of stress younger adults are experiencing now, when compared to the amount of stress previous generations experienced when they were young," Neupert said.

"If these young people are already experiencing historically high levels of stress for their age, and that stress is affecting how old they feel, it will be important for us to pay close attention to the markers we use to assess stress-related physical and mental health for this generation."