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It’s trivia night, and you are ready to go. Obscure Nirvana lyrics? On it. Pop culture references? Yes, please. Seattle Mariners stats? A home run.
This ability to whip out facts and figures in a split second is thanks to your memory, a complex system that allows you to recall everything from how to ride a bike to the lyrics of the “Wicked” soundtrack.
But even the savviest trivia whiz will experience changes in memory function as a part of normal aging.
Luckily, establishing healthy habits early can help promote brain health and support your memory. And the sooner you start practicing them, the more beneficial they will be.
How memory works
There are two main types of memory systems with circuits that are housed in various regions in your brain.
Declarative memory, or factual memory, is your ability to recall events, facts and experiences, such as your third-grade teacher’s name, how you felt on your first day of work, or all those “Wicked” lyrics.
Procedural memory, or muscle memory, is your body’s ability to remember skills and how to do physical tasks like playing an instrument, driving or riding a bike. In these cases, procedural memory kicks in and you go on autopilot without thinking about the individual steps required to complete the tasks.
For you to encode and recall these memories, three processes need to happen smoothly: learning, retention and retrieval. You can think of it like a filing cabinet: Learning is putting information you want to remember into your memory drawer. Storage is keeping that information in the drawer in an organized way. And retrieval is the process of coming back to that drawer later and being able to open it to get that information out.
At its best, your memory functions like an organized filing cabinet with well-labeled folders sorted by topic. At worst, papers are haphazardly stuffed into the drawers and some documents are missing altogether.
“A failure in any one of those memory processes is experienced by most individuals as ‘I forgot,’” says Justin Miller, PhD, a neuropsychologist at the Memory and Brain Wellness Center at Harborview. “But when somebody says, ‘I have a memory problem,’ we want to understand where exactly in the memory process is it failing: Is it a learning problem? Is it a storage problem? Is it a retrieval problem?”
The difference between memory and attention
We often blame forgetfulness on our memory — or worry that it’s a sign of decline in memory function — but it’s important to distinguish between forgetfulness caused by memory versus attention.
“Attention refers to our ability to sustain focus or concentration, while memory refers to learning and retaining new information,” says Tasha Rhoads, PhD, a clinical neuropsychologist at UW Medicine. “As neuropsychologists, we often think of them as two separate yet complimentary processes.”
Attention affects your ability to store information accurately and completely. If you are distracted when taking in new information, it will be harder to recall those details later. In other words, lack of attention means the documents never get into the drawer in the first place.
“It’s almost like when you’re putting information in the drawer, you’ve got to have the light on in the room so you can see where you’re putting it,” says Miller. “If you don’t shine your attentional spotlight onto the conversation so you’re able to take that information in, it might as well be dust.”
Say, for example, you are multitasking and trying to finish a work email while listening to your partner’s day. Later, when they reference a story, you have no idea what they’re talking about. It’s not that you have a faulty memory, it’s that you weren’t paying enough attention to encode (take in) and store that information in the first place.
How aging affects your memory
Even with laser-focused attention, most people will have trouble recalling information as they age due to expected memory changes. This is akin to the door of the filing cabinet sticking and needing some help to open.
Miller gives the example of not remembering that you’ve seen Stars Wars.
“I say, ‘Remember it’s got the guy with the mask who makes that sound?’ And you are like, ‘Oh yeah, Darth Vader, I totally remember,’” says Miller. “I’ve now come along and given you some context and now the drawer’s open and you’re able to recognize all the information that’s in there, when at first you didn’t remember.”
While scientists are still learning what causes age-related memory loss (as well as more serious conditions like dementia), they do know that the hippocampus and frontal lobe are key regions required for memory function and these regions are connected by white matter pathways. Changes in the structure or function of any of these regions can impact learning and recall of information.
Poor cardiovascular health and chronic conditions like Type 2 diabetes and high blood pressure can also damage the brain and accelerate brain aging when left untreated.
Normal versus serious memory problems
As you get older, normal age-related memory problems — or sticky filing cabinet doors — might be trouble coming up with an acquaintance’s name; forgetting about an appointment date but remembering it later; experiencing that tip-of-your-tongue feeling; occasionally losing your train of thought; and misplacing things from time to time.
This is because as you age, information is processed less efficiently, making it harder to hold and manipulate things in your mind or filter out information from the environment you don’t want.
“That can make the process of forming new memories and retrieving them later a bit more challenging,” says Rhoads.
More serious problems might look like forgetting the meaning of common words; losing items and then finding them in odd places; developing unfounded suspicions of your friends and family or other significant personality or behavioral changes; and forgetting things to the extent that it affects daily life. These sorts of issues warrant a visit to the doctor and may be signs of something more serious than just normal aging.
For example, Alzheimer’s disease is one of the most common causes of dementia and has devastating effects on the brain. One of the hallmarks of Alzheimer’s is a poor memory where new information isn’t retained; it’s as if your memory drawer doesn’t have a bottom to it.
“No matter how easily the information goes in and no matter how easy it is for you to open that drawer later, there’s nothing there,” says Miller. “No amount of help, no number of reminders, no amount of prompting is going to help recover that information because it just fell right out the bottom.”
How to protect your memory while you’re young
It’s become more and more clear that practicing healthy brain habits in your 20s, 30s and 40s can help preserve your brain health later in life.
“I often think of things we can do to support brain health, particularly in the early and middle stages of life, as putting money in the bank,” says Rhoads. “Learning new things, reducing stress, and staying mentally and physically healthy are great ways to build resilience during earlier stages of life that can later protect the brain from cognitive decline and help maintain cognitive function as we age.”
If you’ve waited until symptoms have emerged, your ability to address a disease like Alzheimer’s has lessened, though, Miller says, it hasn’t been eliminated. An influential paper reviewing recent research on dementia risk factors found that up to 45% of dementia cases could potentially be prevented by lifestyle changes. And the sooner they are implemented, the more likely they are to be effective in preventing cognitive decline.
So what kind of lifestyle changes can you make?
Address chronic medical conditions
Treating conditions like Type 2 diabetes and high blood pressure and adopting healthy habits like eating a nutritious diet, maintaining a healthy weight, managing blood pressure and cholesterol, and stopping smoking will all decrease your risk for dementia later in life.
Take care of your mental health
Mental health conditions can also affect brain health and lead to memory problems later in life if not addressed. These include chronic stress, depression and anxiety. In fact, anxiety about your memory getting worse can itself lead to problems.
“If you’re anxious, you only have so much cognitive horsepower, and if some of it is allocated to being anxious and worrying, you have less leftover for actual learning and memory,” says Miller.
Finding ways to reduce stress in your life and getting help for depression and anxiety aren’t just good for your well-being today, but also for your brain health as you age.
Be active
Being physically active is not only good for your heart — it’s also crucial for brain health.
“I often say that what is good for the heart will also be good for the brain,” says Rhoads. “This helps to explain why routine physical exercise is one of the best evidence-based strategies to maintain cognitive abilities over time.”
Just make sure to protect your head and wear a helmet if you’re getting on a bike or a pair of skis.
Get enough sleep
Recent studies have found that people who get poor sleep in midlife are at higher risk for developing dementia later in life.
“Sleep has tremendous brain health benefits for all kinds of reasons,” says Miller. “Make sure that you manage things like sleep apnea and if you have chronic problems with sleep, talk to your doctor about what might be contributing to that.”
Be social
A recent analysis from the National Insititute on Aging found that loneliness increased dementia risk by 31%, on par with being physically inactive and smoking. It’s not always easy, especially during the Big Dark, but it’s important to make time for friends and family and to be engaged with your community.
Learn new things
Finally, keeping your mind active promotes brain health, especially by learning new activities. (There is very little evidence, however, that those sudokus and crossword puzzles will directly prevent memory loss.)
Ultimately, there’s no magic pill that will prevent memory loss. Instead, it all comes back to balance and making small changes you can stick to that improve your overall health and well-being.
"People are more likely to be successful when they make sustainable, incremental changes over time and gradually adopt a brain healthy lifestyle,” says Miller. “Try to do more today than you did yesterday. If yesterday you spent 30 minutes walking, maybe today the goal is 35 minutes.”
This article was originally published on August 30, 2021. It has been reviewed and updated with new info. Luke Whelan and Emily Boynton contributed to this article.
