Can Worrying About Aging Actually Age Women Faster?

Key takeaways:

• In a national sample of midlife and older women, more worrying about aging was linked to a faster pace of biological aging as measured by the DunedinPACE epigenetic clock.

• Worries about declining health showed the strongest associations with accelerated aging, more so than worrying about appearance or reproductive aging.

• The link weakened when the researchers accounted for health behaviors like smoking, alcohol use, and BMI, suggesting that worrying may change behavior—and those behaviors then influence biological aging.

The researchers used data from 726 women in the long-running Midlife in the United States (MIDUS) study, a nationally based cohort that collects detailed psychological, biological, and behavioral information. Participants completed questionnaires capturing three types of aging worry:

• Worries about declining attractiveness

• Worries about declining health

• Worries about reproductive aging

Blood samples were analyzed using two second-generation epigenetic clocks: GrimAge2, which reflects cumulative biological damage and mortality risk, and DunedinPACE, which estimates the current pace at which the body is aging. These clocks read patterns of DNA methylation—chemical tags on DNA that shift with age and stress—to quantify “biological wear-and-tear.”

What they actually found on worrying about aging

When the researchers ran adjusted models, health-related aging worries stood out. Women who reported more fear about their health getting worse with age had higher DunedinPACE scores, meaning a faster current rate of biological aging (about a 0.07 standard deviation increase before fully adjusting). Cumulative aging worrying across all domains also showed a similar association with faster DunedinPACE.

Interestingly, these links did not show up with GrimAge2, which captures accumulated lifetime damage, suggesting that aging worries may be more tied to the current pace of decline than to total past exposure. That fits a picture where ongoing psychological stress nudges the body’s systems into a slightly faster “wear-and-tear” mode, rather than instantly rewriting a lifetime of risk.

Health habits may carry part of the effect

The associations between aging worries and faster DunedinPACE weakened and became statistically non-significant after the researchers adjusted for health behaviors such as smoking, alcohol use, and BMI. This pattern suggests that worrying about aging may influence what people do—how they eat, drink, move, or smoke—and those behaviors in turn help shape biological aging.

In other words, the stress of fearing aging might not just sit in the mind; it could feed into a loop where distress leads to less healthy habits, which then accelerate molecular aging. The authors also note that associations were somewhat stronger among women who had a recent history of mood or emotional disorders, hinting that broader emotional health may amplify these effects.

What this means for longevity

For longevity, this study adds to a growing line of evidence that how we think and feel about aging can become biologically embedded. Worrying about health decline is not just a mindset; it may correlate with a measurable uptick in the body’s aging speed, especially when it nudges women toward less supportive health behaviors. That reinforces a biopsychosocial view of aging: subjective experiences, daily habits, and molecular pathways all interact to shape how fast we age.

Practically, it suggests that longevity strategies might need to include not only nutrition, exercise, and sleep, but also healthier narratives about aging and support for coping with aging-related worries in ways that lead to better—not worse—choices.

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