Question: How does your memory degenorate from old age?

Emily Mattacola answered on 12 Nov 2019:

As you learn and remember, your brain doesn’t change its overall structure or grow. Instead, what it does is change the connections between cells. These connections are called synapses. As you learn new things and store new memories, your synapses are reinforced, and cells make more and stronger connections with each other. But as you begin to age, these synapses begin to falter, which begins to affect how easily you can retrieve memories. This is a process which starts in your 20s, but speeds up in our 50s.

We’re not sure why this happens. Some people think that aging causes cells to die in a tiny region in the front of the brain that leads to a drop in the production of a chemical which we need for learning and memory.

As well as this, some parts of the brain that are essential to memory are more affected by aging. One area, called the hippocampus, tends to be lose about 20% of its cells by the time you reach your 80s. Your whole brain also shrinks and becomes less efficient as you age.

Of course, other things can happen to your brain to speed up this decline. You may have inherited some unhealthy genes, or perhaps you smoked or drank too much. All these things speed up memory decline.