Overwhelming evidence now shows that the once common belief that memory decline is a natural consequence of aging is a fallacy. As a person ages, however, it becomes more difficult to pay attention to more than one thing at a time. It takes greater effort to learn something new. It is more difficult to call to mind familiar names and vocabulary words on demand. It takes longer to recall information from long-term memory.

As we get older our ability to lay down new memories is affected. This makes it more difficult to learn new things. Rather than forgetting more easily, we actually take longer to learn new things. Memory studies have shown that about one third of elderly people have difficulty with declarative memory. However, a substantial number of people in their 80s perform as well as people in their 30s on difficult memory tests.

The serious loss of memory is not an inevitable by-product of the aging process. A large-scale study that tracked seniors over a ten-year period found that cognitive decline is not a normal part of aging for most elderly people: 70% of the nearly 6000 seniors in the study showed no significant decline in cognitive function over the ten-year period.

(Haan, M.N., Shemanski, L., Jagust, W.J., Manolio, T.A. & Kuller, L. 1999. The Role of APOE 4 in Modulating Effects of Other Risk Factors for Cognitive Decline in Elderly Persons. JAMA, 282, 40-46).