Advanced pater­nal age at con­cep­tion has pre­vi­ously been shown to affect the result­ing child’s health in many ways. Now, advanced pater­nal age has also been asso­ci­ated with impaired neu­rocog­ni­tive abil­i­ties (“the abil­ity to think and rea­son, includ­ing con­cen­tra­tion, mem­ory, learn­ing, under­stand­ing, speak­ing, and reading”).

Advanced pater­nal age showed sig­nif­i­cant asso­ci­a­tions with poorer scores on all of the neu­rocog­ni­tive mea­sures apart from the Bay­ley Motor score. The find­ings were broadly con­sis­tent in direc­tion and effect size at all three ages [8 months, 4 years, and 7 years].

Inter­est­ingly, advanced mater­nal age was asso­ci­ated with bet­ter scores on all the same mea­sures. Why is this?

It is sus­pected that dam­age to sperm, which can accu­mu­late over a man’s life­time, may be respon­si­ble. A woman’s eggs are formed largely while she is her­self in the womb, but sperm-making cells divide through­out a man’s life­time, increas­ing the chance of muta­tions in sperm.

Damn me and my mutat­ing sperm!