Ruan and Wu (2008) discovered that social environment (specifically the presence of young individuals) can rescue the phenotype of a cytoplasmic superoxide dismutase mutant. We extended these findings by testing the presence of young individuals on an under expressing extra-cellular superoxide dismutase (EC SOD3) mutant fly line (Blackney et al. 2014), with and without an acute oxidative stress. We observed that young helpers extended the lifespan of the EC SOD3 mutants relative to the control line after both were exposed to paraquat. We also found that the presence of young helpers extended lifespan on one of two wild caught lines, but only after they were cleared of Wolbachia. We conclude that the observed positive social effects on aging seen in Ruan's study are dependent on other aspects of the enviornment including oxidative stress, endosymbiont infection and genetic background.