Mind Games - Page 3
How to compensate for age-related memory changes
Glitches in the System As You Age
Breakdowns can and do occur at all stages of the memory process, no matter what your age, but certain memory functions are more sensitive to aging than others.
Highly learned and organized information -- known as semantic memory -- often improves with age. This includes your vocabulary and knowledge of language. Procedural memory, which includes your memory of how to do things, such as ride a bike or set the table, is mostly unaffected by age.
However, episodic memory -- the portion of your long-term memory that includes the events of your everyday life, similar to a daily diary -- is the area of your memory that is most likely to decline somewhat over time. Because of this, you may begin to experience a slight decline in your ability to remember daily events, such as the name of someone you have just met, where you left your keys or glasses, or where you have parked the car. It also might be more difficult to carry on a couple of conversations at once or process large amounts of new information easily.
Such gradual memory changes are not signs of Alzheimer's disease or senility, especially if you are the first one to notice them and they are not interfering with your ability to perform your usual activities.
How to Compensate for Age-Related Changes
Aging brings a variety of physiological changes that may also affect your memory. Fortunately, there are several adjustments you can make to counteract these things.
Impaired senses: Because all memories begin with the senses, any sensory loss, such as impaired vision and hearing, may distort or fragment the information that reaches your sensory memory (Stage 1). And when sensory memory is limited, so too is short- and long-term memory.
What you can do to compensate: As you age, you may need more sensory stimulation in order to perceive new information. Making up for sensory losses is very important. If needed, wear prescription glasses, a hearing aid, or other corrective devices. Have periodic checkups with a medical professional and make sure your prescriptions are current.
Distractions: Your attention level plays a big role in memory function. A lack of interest or attentiveness can make it difficult to register or encode information. Or you may be distracted by your emotional state. Therefore, you never properly encode specific information into your memory. For example, if you're trying to do several things at once or your mind is preoccupied by or wandering to other thoughts, you might not notice where you're putting your keys, eye glasses, or car, or you may not catch someone's name.
What you can do to compensate: Slow down and focus on one thing at a time, making a point to give your full attention to those things you need to remember. If distractions occur, go to another room and close the door, wear earplugs, and write down distracting thoughts so you can address them later.
Processing delays: The speed at which you react to and process information that enters your short-term memory (Stage 2) naturally slows with age. This simply means that acquiring new knowledge requires a more conscious effort on the part of your short-term memory.
Because you have a whole library of information stored in your brain, it can also be a challenge to go back over many years of life and locate things quickly. As a result, you may sometimes need more time to recall information from your long-term memory (names, vocabulary, places, historical facts). Even so, your memory is still easily jogged.
What you can do to compensate: When an item from the past is not easily pulled from long-term memory, try using context cues to aid your recall. Think back to the rooms you were in, the activities you were doing, and the conversations you had. Once you start thinking about specific times, places, and events other details will follow.
To remember new information, seek several different ways in which you can link the new information to an existing memory. It may take more time and effort to commit new information to memory, but there's no limit to the knowledge you can acquire.
Interference: Although your existing knowledge base and perception of the world is often the key to mastering new information, it may sometimes interfere with your comprehension of new things. For instance, your many memories of past holiday celebrations may interfere with how you remember more recent holidays. This is known as proactive inhibition.
You may also forget something you learned previously, because more recent information interferes and has a negative effect on it. This is retroactive inhibition.
Moods and emotions also affect your memory. The emotions attached to an event can reinforce a related memory but can also interfere with remembering other events.
What you can do to compensate: Minimize intellectual interference or mental overcrowding by spending more time reflecting on new information and experiences, which distinguishes them from past knowledge. Clarify the differences, make new associations, synthesize, and organize them so they will not interfere with others. Above all, avoid overcrowding your memory with unorganized material.
If memory conditions result in the following, or if you have serious concerns about your memory, see a doctor for a thorough physical and neurological exam:
- You forget how to read a clock.
- You forget how to drive a car.
- You forget an entire event or experience.
- You forget recent events.
- You forget ever having known a particular person.
- You experience confusion, decreased alertness, or a loss of function.
- You experience any of the above symptoms with more frequency or severity.
