Lifespan Psychology

Founded in 1981 by the late Paul B. Baltes, the Center for Lifespan Psychology (LIP) at the Max Planck Institute for Human Development has helped to establish lifespan psychology as a distinct conceptual approach within developmental psychology. Since 2004, the Center has extended its research program into developmental behavioral neuroscience. Work at the Center is guided by three propositions:

to study lifespan changes in behavior as interactions among maturation, learning, and senescence;
to develop theories and methods that integrate empirical evidence across domains of functioning, timescales, as well as behavioral and neural levels of analysis;
to identify mechanisms of development by exploring age-graded differences in plasticity.

The Center continues to pay special attention to the age periods of late adulthood and old age, which offer unique opportunities for innovation, both in theory and practice. At the same time, it has continuously increased its research on behavioral development during earlier periods of life.

Research Report on the Center for Lifespan Psychology

A Philosopher of the Enlightenment Era: Tetens

"But ... its eminent modifiability, and its predisposition to self-initiated action, may it develop little or much, and may it differ in amount between different individuals, is among the immutable features of humankind, which can be found whereever humans exist."

Johann Nicolaus Tetens (1736-1807), philosopher of the Enlightenment Era

The Center's Projects

The Center for Lifespan Psychology's eight projects follow its guiding propositions and examine different facets of human development across the lifespan. Further information is available under Projects.

Selected Recent Publications

Brod, G., Lindenberger, U., Wagner, A. D., & Shing, Y. L. (2016). Knowledge acquisition during exam preparation improves memory and modulates memory formation. Journal of Neuroscience, 36, 8103–8111. doi: 10.1523/jneurosci.0045-16.2016

Grandy, T. H., Garrett, D. D., Schmiedek, F., & Werkle-Bergner, M. (2016). On the estimation of brain signal entropy from sparse neuroimaging data. Scientific Reports, 6: 23073. doi: 10.1038/srep23073

Kühn, S., & Lindenberger, U. (2016). Research on human plasticity in adulthood: A lifespan agenda. In K. W. Schaie & S. L. Willis (Eds.), Handbook of the psychology of aging (8th ed., pp. 105–123). Amsterdam: Academic Press.

Müller, V., Anokhin, A. P., & Lindenberger, U. (2016). Genetic influences on phase synchrony of brain oscillations supporting response inhibition. International Journal of Psychophysiology. Advance online publication. doi: 10.1016/j.ijpsycho.2016.06.001

Wenger, E., Kühn, S., Verrel, J., Mårtensson, J., Bodammer, N. C., Lindenberger, U., & Lövdén, M. (2016). Repeated structural imaging reveals non-linear progression of experience-dependent volume changes in human motor cortex. Cerebral Cortex. Advance online publication. doi: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2011.11.015

Max Planck UCL Centre for Computational Psychiatry and Ageing Research

Cooperation With University College London (UCL)

The Max Planck UCL Centre for Computational Psychiatry and Ageing Research was launched in April 2014. It is based on an initiative by scientists from the Max Planck Society and UCL targeting the development and application of computational methods that reorganize and improve our understanding of mental illness and behavioral aging.

Further information

Contact

Director:

Ulman Lindenberger

seklindenberger [at] mpib-berlin [dot] mpg [dot] de

New Software

The graphical structural equation modeling software Ωnyx has been released. It was developed by the Center for Lifespan Psychology and the University of Virgina, and is available free of charge!

von Oertzen, T., Brandmaier, A. M., & Tsang, S. (2015). Structural equation modeling with Ωnyx. Structural Equation Modeling, 22, 148–161. doi: 10.1080/ 10705511.2014.935842

LIFE

LIFE is a graduate program of the Max Planck Society. Human development across the lifespan is its research topic.

More information on LIFE

In Memoriam

Paul B. Baltes
(1939–2006)

1980–2004 Director of the Center for Lifespan Psychology