Anxious people are more likely to have poor memory: study

If you’re not sure whether or not you forgot something, don’t fret — it might make matters worse.

New research published in the journal Personality and Individual Differences suggests that those who are anxious are most likely to have a poor memory.

Dr. Weixi Kang, who led the study at Imperial College London, wanted to analyze people’s “episodic memory” — the ability to remember events in our lives using a word recall task.

Participants were surveyed to see how well people recalled their life events, and those results were compared with personality tests covering the “Big Five” traits: agreeableness, conscientiousness, extraversion, neuroticism and openness.

Researchers found that certain personality traits can actually affect how good a person’s memory is. 

Those who had tendencies of worrying, moodiness and negativity performed the worst in memory tests, particularly in the middle-aged and older groups.

“Neuroticism is typically associated with more psychological distress, which may then affect the neural systems that support episodic memory,” Kang told the Daily Mail.

Neuroticism is linked to a variety of factors including stress sensitivity and trouble with sleeping, which can negatively impact memories.

Agreeableness was a trait that also had poor relation to memory, but Kang noted that the reasoning for this is unclear.

Those who had high scores for openness — people who like variety over routine, have a sense of curiosity and adventure and are in touch with their inner feelings — had a better memory.

It is believed that brain-stimulating cultural and physical activities can help benefit memory over time, which is why those who ranked high for openness might have a better memory.

The openness trait is also seemingly linked with lower inflammation in the body, including the brain, which can benefit memory, according to Kang.

The research found that among young people (16 to 35) and middle-aged people (35 to 55), those who were extroverted were more likely to have a better memory. This could be due to a higher amount of social interactions.

However, as people get older, they tend to spend more time focusing on “current and emotionally important relations rather than making more friends.”