University of Cambridge Cognitive Ability Test

I’m now 43 and other day I was looking up test papers for the 11+ (school entrance exams for 11 year olds) and thinking - damn this is HARD!

Anyone else feel like they used to be so much quicker?

I’m in my early 30s and I definitely feel less sharp than in my 20s, but I also feel like my priorities have changed and I have more responsibilities at work and at home, so I have much less ability to just be able to do very long periods of focused studying/thinking like I used to in my 20s

I asked my parents about this as they are both accomplished people and work in STEM/academia.

They both mentioned feeling less sharp when they hit their mid-to-late 30s, which corresponds to… when they had kids. I know correlation isn’t causation, but seeing all of my coworkers who have young children now all mention they’ve had a marked decrease in mental acuity for work due to sleep deprivation (and having to prioritize their kids), I’m going to guess this is it.

I also wonder if you just had a month to focus on refreshing what you learned in school how quickly it would all come back.