FORGOTTEN where you left the keys again? Don鈥檛 worry, your memory hasn鈥檛
gone, you鈥檝e just forgotten how to use it. Randy Buckner and his colleagues at
Washington University, St Louis, monitored brain activity in older and younger
adults while they memorised words. The younger group performed better, and a
specific region of their left frontal cortex lit up as they did the task.
That didn鈥檛 happen in the older subjects, but when they were told to think of
a word鈥檚 meaning at the same time, the brain region was activated and their
performance improved dramatically (Neuron, DOI 10.1016/S0896627302006128).
Buckner speculates that younger people spontaneously employ this memory
strategy, but as the brain ages it stops using it automatically.