1. Sleep

Covering a range from 8 to 10 on this scale is sleep. Sleep will provide you with the highest return-on-investment when it comes to memory or memory improvement. However, sleep is not the same as time in bed. This sleep must be what researchers call restful or restorative sleep—7-9 hours of primarily uninterrupted sleep with full sets of what researchers used to call REM cycles. It is during these deep, restful cycles that memories are sorted, encoded, and placed into long-term memory.

2. Exercise

Next on this scale is exercise, ranging from roughly a 6 to around an 8. Exercise improves blood flow to the brain. Your brain cannot function well without it. But professional athletics is not necessary. Any movement that increases blood flow helps. Simply taking the stairs instead of the elevator, or walking around the block after a meal. Keep moving. Keep that blood flowing through the brain and you will be more likely to keep your memories.

3. Diet

I know you’ve heard the saying that you are what you eat. Well, eating the right things scores between 4 and 7 on this scale. You can boost your brain power by eating more foods with antioxidants and anti-inflammatory agents. Antioxidants capture free radicals that can damage brain cells. Dark-colored fruits and vegetables give you the biggest antioxidant bang for the buck. Avoid foods that trigger inflammatory responses, such as sugars, processed foods, alcohol and refined grains. Foods rich in omega-3 fatty acids, like fish and plant oils, counter inflammation that can damage healthy brain cells.

4. Memory Improvement Programs

Rounding out the bottom of this scale, from 1 to around 3, are commercial, memory improvement programs. Although many people do gain some benefit from “brain game” types of programs, their long-term affects have not been established.

1. The Attention Workout and ACTIVE Memory Works programs ARE NOT brain games. Although our Attention program does share some similarities with commercial brain-game programs, it approaches the use of its activities from a non-gaming focus. Plus, the ACTIVE program functions on a completely different set of principles—principles with proven track records for achieving long-term benefits.
2. Although improvements in sleep, exercise, and diet can achieve higher levels of memory benefit, these benefits can be short-lived. Even temporary changes in these areas can cause immediate and negative affects on your memory—often affecting both short and long-term memory.

Clinical research has proven that the ACTIVE program can cause long-term memory improvement—and remain measurable a full ten years after intervention. In addition, the evidence indicates that those improvements translated into significant improvements in IADL’s, Independent Activities of Daily Living. Participants in the original ACTIVE Study were able to drive and live independently longer than participants in the control groups of this study.

In addition, these beneficial affects appeared to persist in spite of normal, age-related changes to sleeping, exercise, and diet regimes.

Bottom line, although the impact of benefits from programs like the ACTIVE Memory Works program may initially seem low, they can have a significant, statistical, and measurable impact on your memory health for many years into the future.

The Journal of American Geriatrics Society said it best in 2014 when publishing the ACTIVE Study’s final 10-year results. Referring to the people who went through the ACTIVE program; they said…