Money and the Leisure It Brings... The Secret to Longevity at 122 Years Old

Research on the Link Between Health and Longevity: '3 Key Secrets'
More Money Means More Free Time... Less Stress
Active Social Interaction and Communication... Impact on Activity Levels

The secret to longevity of Jeanne Calment, a French woman who holds the Guinness World Record for the longest-lived person in the world, was "money and leisure."
[Photo by CNBC]

The secret to longevity of Jeanne Calment (1875?1997), a French woman who holds the Guinness World Record as the longest-lived person in the world, was "money and leisure." Having money provides time flexibility and reduces stress, which positively affects longevity.

Recently, CNBC Make It introduced three secrets to longevity after Dr. Jean-Marie Robine, a demographer at the French National Institute of Health and Medical Research (INSERM), who met Calment while she was alive, studied the correlation between health and longevity.

Robine said, "Longevity is partly due to exceptional factors such as luck and genetic traits," and identified three factors that influenced Calment's long life based on her life.

The first was Calment's wealth. According to Robine, Calment was born into a bourgeois family in southern France, making her a "rich girl." As a result, she attended school until the age of 16, which was uncommon for women at the time.

Robine introduced the economic leisure Calment had as a secret to longevity, saying, "Until she married at age 20, Calment continued to receive private lessons in cooking, art, and dance."

The second reason was that Calment did not smoke in her youth. After marriage, her husband encouraged her to smoke, but when she first tried it, she thought it was unpleasant and quit smoking. Robine explained that she only started smoking again around the age of 112 while living in a nursing home.

The third was active social engagement. Calment spent most of her time attending social events, interacting and communicating with new people. She was also known to travel frequently. She traveled around various parts of France and even visited the Eiffel Tower while it was still under construction.

Dr. Robine's analysis is that Calment's economic leisure in her youth allowed her to spend a lot of time meeting people and participating in social gatherings, and this activity positively influenced her longevity.

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