Imperial, California - A massive  study at Northwestern University that involved nearly 200,000 participants and that took place over more than 25 years showed that as you grow older you tend to become more trusting, according to the Association of Mature American Citizens.

Backing up that investigation was a second research project that took place at the State University of New York at Buffalo.

"A growing body of research shows that some things actually get better as we age. Our new findings show that trust increases as people get older and, moreover, that people who trust more are also more likely to experience increases in happiness over time," said Northwestern researcher Claudia Haase.

The findings in these two reports may be comforting, but it doesn't mean that the elderly can "drop their guard" with strangers-especially the scammers who prey on older Americans, warns AMAC.