Now write the words again and see how much better your memory has become already. Use your first associations and link the images in any order you like. Perhaps you visualise a clown with orange hair riding a horse, or a doctor smoking a pipe and playing guitar. Look at the eight words again and this time spend a minute creating a story that links them all together. By creating a story that links your unrelated words, your visualisations and associations will automatically boost your recall. One memory technique I recommend, the story method, is useful for remembering lists of items and errands when you’re on the go. Learning to create visual images that represent information you want to recall later will help jump-start your memory abilities. Then write down as many of the words as you can remember, for your baseline memory score: Then spend 10 minutes doing something else. Set a stopwatch for one minute to study the words. You can try it for yourself by assessing your baseline memory and checking it again after learning some of the techniques.īelow is a list of eight unrelated words. In my book, 2 Weeks to a Younger Brain, Gigi Vorgan and I describe the scientific evidence that lifestyle habits matter when it comes to brain health, as well as 14 days of strategies and exercises to get readers started on a brain-healthy lifestyle they can continue for the rest of their lives. These results are consistent with other research indicating the synergistic benefits of combining healthy behaviours to lower risk for diabetes and heart disease. Respondents who engaged in just one healthy behaviour were 21% less likely to report memory problems, while those engaged in three healthy behaviours were 75% less likely to notice forgetfulness. The greater number of healthy lifestyle habits (ie physical exercise, healthy diet, not smoking) that people practised, the better were their memory scores. In collaboration with the Gallup Poll organisation, our UCLA research team evaluated responses from more than 18,000 people aged from 18 to 99 on behaviours that support memory. However, the challenge becomes much easier when people understand the link between everyday behaviour and brain health, set goals that are reasonable and receive feedback that motivates them. Unfortunately, despite compelling science that everyday behaviours can improve memory and lower dementia risk, most people find it difficult to change old habits. We observed reduced activity in the brain’s frontal lobe, which may reflect greater cognitive efficiency of a brain region involved in working memory, a form of short-term memory concerned with immediate cognitive processing and problem solving. Our team has shown that a two-week programme combining mental and physical exercise, stress reduction and healthy diet is associated with significant effects on cognition and brain metabolism that we measured using PET (positron emission tomography) scans. Sharon’s experience was similar to that of many others who have enrolled in our healthy lifestyle programmes and research protocols. These striking improvements motivated her to maintain her new healthy brain habits over the years. Her healthy diet and exercise routines helped Sharon shed a few unwanted pounds, and she felt more confident – both at home and at work. Sharon was amazed that in just two weeks she had enhanced her memory and found it easier to learn and retrieve new information. After two weeks, her memory tests demonstrated significant improvements, and a follow-up MRI showed minimal neural activity during word recall – her brain had become more efficient. Sharon then started a programme of daily physical exercise, memory training, healthy diet and relaxation exercises. Before beginning the programme, her baseline memory scores were about average for her age, and MRI scanning during memory tasks showed extensive neural activity – her brain was working hard to remember things. I convinced Sharon to enrol in a two-week research project at the UCLA Longevity Center to determine the brain effects of a healthy lifestyle programme.
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