Age-Related Memory Loss for Ageing Individuals and Solutions to It - Term Paper Example

Abstract

This is a research on Age-related memory loss for aging individuals and possible solutions to it. This topic has been most people’s concern since many people don’t understand why older people tend to forget things faster than young people, or people of middle age to be precise. It is also focused on finding out why very young people aged between 4 to 6 years old, tend to be the fastest in forgetting things, is it concentration level? (Gazzaniga, 2014). Alternatively, is it that youngest people are just created to forget like that? Or is it just natural and obvious? To get answers to these questions, we assessed groups of individuals aged from four years and above to be sure whether there was any difference in the capacity of remembering things by people from different age groups. We also wanted to confirm if there are some ways e.g. good eating, exercising, lack of stress, putting brain into active thinking among other ways that could help an individual to avoid the memory deterioration problem. For this case, we selected the age group composed of the old people only, we grouped them into two groups; one composed of those who exercised ate well, put their brains into action and lived stress-free lives. We then tested them on their level of retaining information based on those practices. We then selected another group of old people from the same age group category, but for their case, they were the types that never exercised nor ate well, they also didn’t exercise their brains or did any of the things that we used to classify the first group. We then used both groups as the subjects of the research. We used methods like presenting each group with items and checking the percentage remembered, another method used was having a few individuals introduce themselves then we see how those different groups could remember the names chunks, where we found that very young child remembered the least followed by older adults who also seemed to be remembering only a few chunks of information. But the performance of young adults was fairly well as compared to other groups.

Age-related memory loss for aging individuals

You have had several experiences with the old people’s forgetting capacity, one time you hear them complaining that someone has taken their phone or the key is lost or they ask you who you are yet you are the first grandson. This problem of brain deterioration begins at twenties and pick up at fifties as it heads towards its peak as an individual grows old.

It is generally true of older people to find it more difficult learning new things, remembering old information and also multitasking. This weakening of brain with increase in age is evident among us in each and every society and cannot be debated against. The only thing is to try understanding it. But to do so, we need to get to know first how the human brain works.

Whenever our senses perceive something, several other parts of our brain like the frontal cortex and the hippocampus determine if it will be encoded as a memory. This is based on several factors. These factors could include how much interesting the subject is, how closely are we paying attention and whether we have the interest to remember the same, electrical impulses can then carry the information to be stored in various units of the brain.

The information is then transported by the impulses across the synapses between neurons. At that time chemical messengers are released which are called neurotransmitters. The more messengers sent by the cells, the more the synapses become stronger.

When this action is repeated several time like when someone is reading for a text or preparing for some contest, the stronger the connections become. When these connections become very strong then there is better ability to remember. This information, therefore, can be retrieved from the storage later on as desired.

Our brain loses its cells as we age. These cells are essential for the memory. They are the ones which the memory use for the retrieval and encoding processes. The overall weight of our brain also reduces as we become older and the cells e.g. those producing neurotransmitters like acetylcholine which causes connections between the synapses become older.

Scientists also say that the hippocampus loses up to five percent of its neurons in every decade, but by the age of 80, twenty to thirty percent is lost. As one ages, changes are realized in the white matter, part of the brain that takes part in relaying information through the nerve cell fibers.

The deterioration of human brain does not just come from the moon or the clouds just because they are aging. There are several factors however that determines the extent to which one’s memory is being deteriorated. These factors can be reversed to some degree. They include low-stress levels, a healthy diet, avoidance of tobacco and alcohol and also physical exercise. These factors if observed correctly they can be of great advantage to our brains and may help our memory remain good even as we grow in age. In addition, we cannot underestimate the importance of mental stimulation being part of our daily life to keep our memory to be good even as we grow old. Some of the things we could do to enhance our memory stimulation include reading, doing puzzles and drawing just to mention a few. They stimulate the growth of dendrites to maintain strong connections between neurons. The aging individual should try their best to treat their brains just like they treat any other muscles. You either use it or lose it.

Method

Participants

In data collection, there participated 20 undergraduate students (10 men and 10 girls) from Economics class who volunteered in data collection. They were generally aged between 16 -26 years. There were several volunteers so for us to find the exact number we needed, only volunteers whose grade ranged between 60points and 70points were selected.

Materials

Here we did not use special materials of any kind in this research but we used six age groups which had been pre-selected. These people were aged from age four upwards. We, therefore, tested sixty people in total, ten from each pre-selected group on their ability to recall items. To do this, we randomly selected fifteen items from that house and placed all of them on a table following a given manner of arrangement. We also used four of our members who introduced themselves to various groups by saying their names and the respondents were expected to remember the names.

Procedure

Then the people under test were given forty seconds to check on the items so that they could be able to recall them after they are taken away from them. After the time elapsed, we took away the test items for fifteen minutes before we came back to examine them based on the items that were on the table. We wanted them to try if they could remember the fifteen items. We then determined the average number of items remembered by each age group per each age group. We then graphed the percentage of items remembered per age group and compared them.

Second, to this, we took subjects from same age groups to their given rooms, each group in their room. Four of us then introduced their names to them, a group at a time and for each group, we waited for five minutes then we went back to check if they could recall those who had introduced themselves to them. We wanted to see the extent to which each group could remember.

Thirdly, we collected two groups of individuals both aged 60 years old and above. One group of these individuals had a group of the old people that exercise, eat a well-balanced diet, and frequently work on puzzles and or read magazines or any type of reading on a frequent basis and were also stress-free. The other groups consisted of individuals who have a reason to be stressed and are therefore stressed in their lives in some way. They also neither walk a lot nor do any type of workout at all, they don’t read but eat junk and not balanced diet on a frequent basis. We did the same tests that we had done on the previous groups.

Results

For the first test, the test subjects who had most of the items recalled were from age group 22 to 40-year-old. They recalled 11.7 items averagely out of the fifteen items that they tested with. When this was calculated in percentage, we found that it was 78%. The least number of items were remembered by test subjects of age group 4 to 6 years old as they only recalled an average of 5.8 out of the 15 items tested with. When we calculated this in terms of percentage we realized it was just 39%. The subjects of age group 7 – 10 years old averagely remembered 9 out of the 15 items, which put the percentage number of items remembered by them at 60%. The test subjects of age group between 11 and 21 years old averagely had 11.5 out of 15 test items remembered putting them at 77%. The test subjects of age group 41 to 60 years old remembered an average of 10.5 items out of the 15 items putting their percentage score at 70%. Then the test subjects from age group 61 years and above only remembered 8.1 items averagely putting the at the percentage of 54 %.

The results from the second test had slight difference in terms of percentages from the first one but still, they actually kept the same trend and conveyed the same information. The highest percentage of people were remembered by the group composed of those between 22 to 40 years old. Their percentage fell at 80%. Those subjects from age 4 to 6 years old still were the last, they remembered fewest names. They remembered the names at 34%. Then those from age group of 7 to 10 remembered at 58% as those from age group 11 to 21 remembered our members who had introduced themselves at 72%. The test subjects of age group 41 to 60 years old remembered an average percentage score at 70%. Then the test subjects from age group 61 years and above only remembered an average percentage of 51 % (Gazzaniga, 2014).

From these results, we found out that there was a gradual increase in the memory capacity for children aged from four years old. We realized that those children who are of 7 to 10 years old could really remember things ranging from the items that we used from the research and even the names of the four individuals who had introduced themselves to them. From this we could comfortably say that the kids from age 4 to 6 still had their brains growing so could not remember things very well, that’s why those from age 7 to 10 years could remember better than them.

We also realized that those test subjects from age group 11 to 21 had their brains grown and therefore that’s the reason why they could remember better than both those subjects of group 4 to 6 and those of group 7 to 10. But we also clearly see that the test subjects from the age group of 22 to 40 has their brain remembering things at the peak. This is because their brains have grown to its best capacity hence the capability to retain a lot of information. Unlike the test subjects from age 41 to 60 and those from 60 and above, they can remember` better (Graik,2014).

But now we realized another challenge here since we could also see that from the research those from age 61 and above are poor in remembering things than those of age 41 to 60. This shows that as an individual gets older their remembering capacity deteriorates.

This gave us a general argument based on the research for that reason that the brain of an individual grows as he grows in age until he is around 20 years of age making their remembering capacity grow along the years, after which the peak is reached at around 40 years old. After that, there is no further growth of an individual’s brain but instead, it starts to deteriorate. It picks the peak of deterioration when they are aged around 60 and above (Gazzaniga, 2014).

In the third part of the research, the group of old people who lived stress-free ate well, exercised, and read a lot could remember the given items at an average percentage at 61% and they could remember the four names which were introduced to them at 57%.

This made us generalize this part of research that there can be solutions to the age-based brain defect. Until now we said that eating well, exercising frequently, putting brain into practice by making it think as you try to react to some puzzle problems or playing chess or reading or just anything of that type could be of advantage to your brain .

Discussion

We came up with a conclusion that age has effect on memory. We believed that the group of test subjects who were aged between 4 and 6 had their brains still growing hence did not have enough capacity to grasp what was happening during the research even though they may also not have paid improper attention in observing what was happening at the time of the research since they are young. Memory peaks at age 22 to 40 years and then start declining at around forty years. The results realized from age 7 to 10 were better than those from age 4 to 6 showing that their brain had grown better. Results of test subjects aged between 11 and 21 are better than the results of the test subjects aged between 7 and 10 and are closer to the peak results just like those of the individuals aged between 22 and 40 years. This shows that individuals aged between 11 and 21 have their brains almost at the peak of remembering capacity.

Until now we also said that eating well, exercising frequently, putting brain into practice by making it think as you try to react to some puzzle problems or playing chess or reading or just anything of that type could be of advantage to your brain. It is therefore acceptable to bear with your grandmother when she always claims to have their things misplaced or they have forgotten you. But advise them to do healthy things listed above to help retain their remembering capacity. The Brain is just like any other body muscle, use it or lose it .

For the case of poor concentration in the adults, apart from stress, anxiety disorders could be one of the cause. Psychotherapy therefore and supportive counseling could be used by psychologist to treat such conditions in adults. The anxiety related disorders could include; post-traumatic stress disorder, generalized anxiety disorder, obsessive-compulsive disorder and panic disorder.