In The News This Week … Oct. 2–8, 2004: Imagination & Taking Meds

Well, technically this is old news, but it's interesting!

A June 4, 2004 press release from the US National Institute on Aging (NIA) tells how researchers found that using the imagination helps older people remember to take medications and follow other medical advice.

Participants in the study were aged 60 to 81 and, though they were non-diabetic, were required to do four blood sugar tests per day, in order to simulate learning conditions faced by older adults newly diagnosed with a disease.

The results showed that older adults who spent a few minutes picturing how they would test blood sugar were 50% more likely to do so regularly than those using other memory techniques. The imagination group spent three minutes visualizing where they would be and what they would be doing the next day when they were scheduled to do their blood tests. The other two memory techniques tested were rote learning, or repeatedly reciting aloud the instructions for testing their blood, and writing a list of pros and cons for testing blood sugar. Those exercising the imagination remembered to test their blood sugar at the right times of day 76% of the time, compared to 46% of the time in the other groups.

One of the researchers, Dr. Denise Park of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, suspects that imagination's effectiveness may result from the fact that it relies on automatic memory, "a primitive component of memory that doesn't decline with age. Using this technique, you might, for example, imagine taking your pills right after you drink your morning glass of orange juice. The next day at breakfast taking a sip of orange juice will 'automatically' cue you to take your medication."

The actual study, entitled Aging and Medical Adherence: The Use of Automatic Processes to Achieve Effortful Things, can be found in the June 2004 issue of Psychology and Aging.

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