Books and Articles by Health in Aging Foundation

Hatice Yardım @ UnsplashReading retention is a big issue in educational circles. Having the ability to read a sentence, pronounce all the words fluently, and have a vocabulary wide enough that doesn't necessitate referring to a dictionary is one thing. But having the ability to remember what you read is something else entirely.

The great news about the steps you can take to improve your chances of long-term cognitive health is that many of them are the same steps you take to keep your body healthy. You need to add just a couple of items to a list that's probably already familiar. And the new items are fun. © Shutterstock.comHere's the familiar stuff: Reduce stress.

Getting older and being sexually active aren't mutually exclusive. Sexual satisfaction is still possible at any age. Although age-related changes may necessitate some adjustments, where there's a will there's a way. For both men and women, physiological changes to the body make having sex a different experience as you age, but different doesn't mean worse; it just means adapting.

Logic puzzles can take a variety of forms. They can involve words, numbers, or images, and — like all puzzles — they can be fairly easy or extremely difficult to solve.Preparing to solve logic puzzles isn't like preparing to solve a crossword or Sudoku puzzle. You don't need to understand how the puzzle is constructed or what the rules are.

Cryptograms are more complicated than word searches and word scrambles, and they'll almost certainly require more of your time. But solving a cryptogram is really satisfying — it makes you feel like a master detective — so the extra time is well worth it.A cryptogram is a sentence or phrase that's encrypted or enciphered.

Scientific evidence demonstrates that musical training improves memory; musicians tend to remember more information compared to non-musicians, even when you take their education levels and their ages into account. In other words, playing a musical instrument activates part of the brain (the cerebral cortex), which in turn boosts recall of information.

If you've never thought of yourself as a creative person, it's time for a change of thinking. Each person has the potential to unlock an aspect of creativity. Here are a few suggestions to help you get going. They include tips on simple drawing activities to get you started — but if you feel that you still need more encouragement, why not simply begin by doodling?

"Is the brain of a creative person different from a methodical person?" To answer that question, researchers looked at the brain activity of those who solve problems creatively with that burst of "Aha!" compared to those who solve problems more systematically.They asked each participant to relax for a few minutes while they used an electroencephalogram (EEG) to record the electrical activity in participants' brains.

Visual-spatial memory skills are how you learn about the world right from the beginning. As a baby, your visual-spatial skills are especially strong. Perhaps because babies haven't yet developed language skills, they're able to quickly take a snapshot of the world and remember certain visual features.Think for a moment about a baby's world.