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Here's an intriguing fact.

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In the developed world,

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everywhere, women live an average
of six to eight years longer than men do.

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Six to eight years longer.

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That's, like, a huge gap.

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In 2015, the "Lancet" published an article

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showing that men in rich countries

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are twice as likely to die as women are

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at any age.

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But there is one place in the world

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where men live as long as women.

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It's a remote, mountainous zone,

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a blue zone,

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where super longevity

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is common to both sexes.

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This is the blue zone in Sardinia,

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an Italian island in the Mediterranean,

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between Corsica and Tunisia,

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where there are six times
as many centenarians

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as on the Italian mainland,

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less than 200 miles away.

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There are 10 times as many centenarians

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as there are in North America.

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It's the only place
where men live as long as women.

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But why?

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My curiosity was piqued.

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I decided to research the sights
and the habits of the place,

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and I started with the genetic profile.

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I discovered soon enough

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that genes account for just
25 percent of their longevity.

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The other 75 percent is lifestyle.

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So what does it take
to live to 100 or beyond?

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What are they doing right?

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What you're looking at
is an aerial view of Villagrande.

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It's a village at the epicenter
of the blue zone

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where I went to investigate this,

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and as you can see, architectural beauty
is not its main virtue,

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density is:

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tightly spaced houses,

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interwoven alleys and streets.

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It means that the villagers' lives
constantly intersect.

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And as I walked through the village,

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I could feel hundreds
of pairs of eyes watching me

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from behind doorways and curtains,

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from behind shutters.

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Because like all ancient villages,

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Villagrande couldn't have survived

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without this structure,
without its walls, without its cathedral,

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without its village square,

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because defense and social cohesion
defined its design.

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Urban priorities changed as we moved
towards the industrial revolution

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because infectious disease
became the risk of the day.

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But what about now?

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Now, social isolation
is the public health risk of our time.

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Now, a third of the population says

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they have two or fewer people to lean on.

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But let's go to Villagrande
now as a contrast

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to meet some centenarians.

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Meet Giuseppe Marino.
He's 102, a supercentenarian

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and a lifelong resident
of the village of Villagrande.

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He was a gregarious man.

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He loved to recount stories

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such as how he lived like a bird

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from what he could find
on the forest floor

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during not one but two world wars,

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how he and his wife,
who also lived past 100,

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raised six children
in a small, homey kitchen

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where I interviewed him.

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Here he is with his sons
Angelo and Domenico,

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both in their 70s
and looking after their father,

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and who were quite frankly
very suspicious of me and my daughter

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who came along with me
on this research trip,

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because the flip side of social cohesion

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is a wariness of strangers and outsiders.

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But Giuseppe, he wasn't suspicious at all.

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He was a happy-go-lucky guy,

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very outgoing with a positive outlook.

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And I wondered: so is that what it takes
to live to be 100 or beyond,

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thinking positively?

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Actually, no.

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(Laughter)

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Meet Giovanni Coreas. He's 101,

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the grumpiest person I have ever met.

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(Laughter)

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And he put a lie to the notion

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that you have to be positive
to live a long life.

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And there is evidence for this.

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When I asked him why he lived so long,

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he kind of looked at me
under hooded eyelids and he growled,

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"Nobody has to know my secrets."

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(Laughter)

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But despite being a sourpuss,

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the niece who lived with him
and looked after him

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called him "Il Tesoro," "my treasure."

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And she respected him and loved him,

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and she told me, when I questioned
this obvious loss of her freedom,

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"You just don't understand, do you?

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Looking after this man is a pleasure.

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It's a huge privilege for me.

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This is my heritage."

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And indeed, wherever I went
to interview these centenarians,

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I found a kitchen party.

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Here's Giovanni with his two nieces,

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Maria above him

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and beside him his great-niece Sara,

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who came when I was there
to bring fresh fruits and vegetables.

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And I quickly discovered by being there

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that in the blue zone, as people age,

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and indeed across their lifespans,

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they're always surrounded
by extended family, by friends,

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by neighbors, the priest,
the barkeeper, the grocer.

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People are always there or dropping by.

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They are never left
to live solitary lives.

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This is unlike the rest
of the developed world,

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where as George Burns quipped,

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"Happiness is having a large,
loving, caring family in another city."

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(Laughter)

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Now, so far we've only met men,

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long-living men, but I met women too,

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and here you see Tzia Teresa.

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She, at over 100, taught me
how to make the local specialty,

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which is called culorjones,

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which are these large pasta pockets

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like ravioli about this size,

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this size,

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and they're filled
with high-fat ricotta and mint

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and drenched in tomato sauce.

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And she showed me
how to make just the right crimp

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so they wouldn't open,

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and she makes them
with her daughters every Sunday

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and distributes them
by the dozens to neighbors and friends.

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And that's when I discovered
a low-fat, gluten-free diet

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is not what it takes
to live to 100 in the blue zone.

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(Applause)

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Now, these centenarians' stories
along with the science that underpins them

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prompted me to ask myself
some questions too,

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such as, when am I going to die
and how can I put that day off?

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And as you will see,
the answer is not what we expect.

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Julianne Holt-Lunstad is a researcher
at Brigham Young University

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and she addressed this very question

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in a series of studies

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of tens of thousands of middle aged people

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much like this audience here.

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And she looked at every
aspect of their lifestyle:

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their diet, their exercise,

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their marital status,

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how often they went to the doctor,

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whether they smoked or drank, etc.

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She recorded all of this

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and then she and her colleagues
sat tight and waited for seven years

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to see who would still be breathing.

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And of the people left standing,

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what reduced their chances
of dying the most?

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That was her question.

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So let's now look at her data in summary,

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going from the least powerful
predictor to the strongest.

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OK?

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So clean air, which is great,

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it doesn't predict how long you will live.

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Whether you have your hypertension treated

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is good.

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Still not a strong predictor.

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Whether you're lean or overweight,
you can stop feeling guilty about this,

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because it's only in third place.

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How much exercise you get is next,

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still only a moderate predictor.

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Whether you've had a cardiac event
and you're in rehab and exercising,

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getting higher now.

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Whether you've had a flu vaccine.

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Did anybody here know

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that having a flu vaccine
protects you more than doing exercise?

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Whether you were drinking and quit,

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or whether you're a moderate drinker,

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whether you don't smoke,
or if you did, whether you quit,

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and getting towards the top predictors

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are two features of your social life.

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First, your close relationships.

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These are the people
that you can call on for a loan

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if you need money suddenly,

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who will call the doctor
if you're not feeling well

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or who will take you to the hospital,

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or who will sit with you
if you're having an existential crisis,

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if you're in despair.

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Those people, that little clutch of people

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are a strong predictor, if you have them,
of how long you'll live.

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And then something that surprised me,

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something that's called
social integration.

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This means how much
you interact with people

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as you move through your day.

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How many people do you talk to?

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And these mean both
your weak and your strong bonds,

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so not just the people
you're really close to,

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who mean a lot to you,

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but, like, do you talk to the guy
who every day makes you your coffee?

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Do you talk to the postman?

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Do you talk to the woman who walks
by your house every day with her dog?

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Do you play bridge or poker,
have a book club?

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Those interactions
are one of the strongest predictors

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of how long you'll live.

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Now, this leads me to the next question:

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if we now spend more time online
than on any other activity,

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including sleeping,

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we're now up to 11 hours a day,

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one hour more than last year, by the way,

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does it make a difference?

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Why distinguish
between interacting in person

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and interacting via social media?

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Is it the same thing as being there

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if you're in contact constantly
with your kids through text, for example?

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Well, the short answer
to the question is no,

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it's not the same thing.

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Face-to-face contact releases
a whole cascade of neurotransmitters,

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and like a vaccine,
they protect you now in the present

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and well into the future.

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So simply making
eye contact with somebody,

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shaking hands, giving somebody a high-five

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is enough to release oxytocin,

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which increases your level of trust

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and it lowers your cortisol levels.

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So it lowers your stress.

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And dopamine is generated,
which gives us a little high

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and it kills pain.

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It's like a naturally produced morphine.

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Now, all of this passes
under our conscious radar,

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which is why we conflate
online activity with the real thing.

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But we do have evidence now,
fresh evidence,

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that there is a difference.

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So let's look at some of the neuroscience.

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Elizabeth Redcay, a neuroscientist
at the University of Maryland,

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tried to map the difference

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between what goes on in our brains
when we interact in person

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versus when we're watching
something that's static.

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And what she did was
she compared the brain function

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of two groups of people,

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those interacting live with her

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or with one of her research associates

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in a dynamic conversation,

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and she compared that
to the brain activity of people

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who were watching her talk
about the same subject

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but in a canned video, like on YouTube.

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And by the way, if you want to know

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how she fit two people
in an MRI scanner at the same time,

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talk to me later.

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So what's the difference?

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This is your brain
on real social interaction.

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What you're seeing
is the difference in brain activity

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between interacting in person
and taking in static content.

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In orange, you see the brain areas
that are associated with attention,

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social intelligence --

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that means anticipating
what somebody else is thinking

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and feeling and planning --

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and emotional reward.

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And these areas become much more engaged

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when we're interacting
with a live partner.

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Now, these richer brain signatures

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might be why recruiters
from Fortune 500 companies

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evaluating candidates

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thought that the candidates were smarter

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when they heard their voices

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compared to when they just
read their pitches in a text, for example,

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or an email or a letter.

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Now, our voices and body language
convey a rich signal.

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It shows that we're thinking, feeling,

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sentient human beings

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who are much more than an algorithm.

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Now, this research by Nicholas Epley

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at the University of Chicago
Business School

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is quite amazing because
it tells us a simple thing.

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If somebody hears your voice,

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they think you're smarter.

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I mean, that's quite a simple thing.

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Now, to return to the beginning,

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why do women live longer than men?

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And one major reason
is that women are more likely

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to prioritize and groom
their face-to-face relationships

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over their lifespans.

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Fresh evidence shows

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that these in-person friendships

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create a biological force field
against disease and decline.

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And it's not just true of humans

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but their primate relations,
our primate relations as well.

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Anthropologist Joan Silk's work
shows that female baboons

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who have a core of female friends

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show lower levels of stress
via their cortisol levels,

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they live longer and they have
more surviving offspring.

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At least three stable relationships.

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That was the magic number.

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Think about it.

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I hope you guys have three.

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The power of such face-to-face contact

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is really why there are
the lowest rates of dementia

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among people who are socially engaged.

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It's why women who have breast cancer

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are four times more likely
to survive their disease than loners are.

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Why men who've had a stroke
who meet regularly to play poker

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or to have coffee

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or to play old-timer's hockey --

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I'm Canadian, after all --

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(Laughter)

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are better protected
by that social contact

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than they are by medication.

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Why men who've had a stroke
who meet regularly --

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this is something very
powerful they can do.

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This face-to-face contact
provides stunning benefits,

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yet now almost a quarter of the population
says they have no one to talk to.

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We can do something about this.

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Like Sardinian villagers,

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it's a biological imperative
to know we belong,

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and not just the women among us.

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Building in-person interaction
into our cities, into our workplaces,

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into our agendas

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bolsters the immune system,

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sends feel-good hormones
surging through the bloodstream and brain

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and helps us live longer.

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I call this building your village,

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and building it and sustaining it
is a matter of life and death.

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Thank you.

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(Applause)

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Moderator: Susan, come back.
I have a question for you.

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I'm wondering if there's a middle path.

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So you talk about the neurotransmitters
connecting when in face-to-face,

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but what about digital technology?

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We've seen enormous improvements
in digital technology

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like FaceTime, things like that.

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Does that work too?

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I mean, I see my nephew.

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He plays Minecraft
and he's yelling at his friends.

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It seems like he's connecting pretty well.

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Is that useful? Is that helpful?

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Susan Pinker: Some of the data
are just emerging.

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The data are so fresh
that the digital revolution happened

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and the health data trailed behind.

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So we're just learning,

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but I would say
there are some improvements

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that we could make in the technology.

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For example, the camera on your laptop
is at the top of the screen,

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so for example, when you're
looking into the screen,

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you're not actually making eye contact.

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So something as simple
as even just looking into the camera

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can increase those neurotransmitters,

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or maybe changing
the position of the camera.

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So it's not identical, but I think
we are getting closer with the technology.

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Moderator: Great. Thank you so much.

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SP: Thank you.

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(Applause)