Our brains work hard to compensate for age-related changes in working memory, a key component of cognitive function. 

Every conversation you follow, every errand you mentally juggle, every moment you hold a thought long enough to act on it — that’s your working memory in action. It’s not the kind of memory that stores your childhood or recalls a face from a decade ago. It’s the one running quietly in the background right now, keeping you functional, focused, and a step ahead.

Unfortunately, working memory tends to decline and change with age more than short-term memory, research suggests. Brain scans show that even when older adults perform well on working memory tests, it’s often because they’re working their brain networks harder — or tapping into more brain networks — compared with younger people. 

A compensatory mechanism, this is a phenomenon known as over-recruitment. The brain works extra hard to meet the demands of a task that once required less effort. While adaptive, over-recruitment could have a downside: allowing normal performance while obscuring the early neural changes taking shape.

Here’s how our brains try to keep up with age-related changes in working memory, and how to give yours an assist.

Is Your Working Memory Working Too Hard?

Neuroimaging studies comparing healthy younger and older adults reveal what memory tests alone can’t. Functional MRIs measure brain activity by showing how much oxygenated blood flows to specific brain regions. Increased activation could signal that you’re trying to fire neurons faster or recruit more neurons to accomplish the task at hand, says Nathan S. Rose, PhD, research scientist at the Northeastern Brain Game Center & SoundMind Collaboratory at Northeastern University.

“If you have younger adults perform a word list learning experiment, they’re going to activate a portion of the left inferior frontal gyrus when they’re encoding the words and trying to make those memories,” said Rose. “The basic essence around compensatory recruitment is that older adults will also activate that same area, but they may activate it more, and especially at lower loads.” 

Some older adults even activate the same brain region on the opposite side for an extra boost. Overall, this may be an adaptive response to age-related memory changes. However, when people need to tap the other side of the brain during relatively simple tasks (like memorizing three words from a list) this can signal a problem, says Rose.

The researcher notes that the term “compensatory” can be misleading, since it implies that various ways of completing these cognitive tasks have equal value. “The older adults who are showing this compensatory recruitment, especially at lower loads… that is not necessarily the case,” he tells Super Age. 

Why Working Memory Takes More Brainpower with Age

Before you can recall something, you first need to perceive and encode it to create the memory. This begins with your senses, which can also deteriorate with time. Age-related vision changes (caused by reduced flexibility of the eye’s lenses) and hearing loss (caused by degradation of hair cells in the inner ears) make it harder to create these memories.

“From the get-go, older adults are having to compensate for these degraded sensory and perceptual representations, and that feeds forward into the representations that get encoded in memory,” explains Rose.

To retrieve the information later, your brain needs processing ability, like a computer. Age-related changes in gray matter volume and damage to tiny brain blood vessels can reduce processing speed and make retrieval more challenging.

Older people do have time and experience on their side. Compared to younger adults, older people use more shortcuts and inferences to aid memory, notes Rose. However, when researchers devise tricky memory experiments, they can see the differences in performance — and over-recruitment — that might not be noticeable in day-to-day life. 

Short of signing up for a brain imaging study — which, honestly, sounds fascinating — you can’t tell for sure whether (or how much) over-recruitment is happening in your brain. However, if things feel harder, consider it a clue. Research shows that effort does correlate with neural activity during tasks that challenge working memory. 

3 Ways to Protect Working Memory

1. Take more walks. While we can’t always know the exact inner workings of our brains, we can take comfort knowing that exercise is proven to help maintain them. “By far the strongest evidence comes from cardiovascular exercise,” says Rose. “If it’s good for your heart, it’s probably good for your head. Exercise improves your ability to pump blood from your heart through your blood vessels to (and within) your brain, and you don’t even have to do that much. “We’re talking about walking 30 minutes at least three, probably five times a week,” Rose adds. 
   
2. Play brain games that test the types of things you want to remember. Tap into neuroplasticity[noor-oh-plas-tis-i-tee]nounThe brain’s ability to change and adapt through experience.Learn MoreClose — the ability to form new neural connections. “It certainly is possible to practice working memory tasks and get better at that task to really, really profound levels,” offers Rose. His team is researching ways to develop cognitive tests and tools that deliver individualized cognitive training. 
   
3. Prioritize brain-supporting nutrients. Omega-3s and various vitamins (particularly B, D, C, and E) are both beneficial for brain health. But some experts suggest focusing on flavonoids — phytonutrients that protect neurons from damage and enhance cerebral blood flow[bluhd floh]nounThe movement of blood through the circulatory system, delivering oxygen and nutrients to organs and tissues to support energy, healing, and overall health.Learn MoreClose.
   
   In a study published in the journal Neurology, researchers analyzed food diaries and cognitive test results from people aged 60-100. The team linked higher intake of flavonols with slower declines in working memory and other cognitive measures, attributing the differences to their antioxidant and anti-inflammatory[an-tee-in-flam-uh-tawr-ee]adjectiveReducing inflammation, which contributes to better overall health.Learn MoreClose properties. You can find flavonols in onions, ginger, broccoli, asparagus, and leafy greens, the USDA says. 
   
   Similar but distinct in their chemical composition and dietary sources, flavanols are also beneficial for the brain, boosting “executive functions, attention and memory.” Dietary sources of flavanols include red wine, chocolate, black and green tea. 

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