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YOUR BRAIN CAN IMPROVE WITH AGE





It turns out that your brain isn’t on a one-way trip downhill after your 30s—or even your 80s. In a study spanning three years and nearly 4,000 adults aged 19 to 94, scientists at The University of Texas at Dallas found that the brain can actually get sharper as you age, so long as you give it a little attention each day (UT Dallas, 2026).

The research, published in Scientific Reports, is part of The BrainHealth Project, an initiative launched in 2020 to figure out what keeps our minds resilient and healthy as we get older. Participants spent just five to fifteen minutes a day on mental exercises, and the results were undeniable: improvements showed up in thinking clarity, emotional balance, and even people’s sense of purpose (UT Dallas, 2026; Scientific Reports, 2026).

The team measured these changes using the BrainHealth Index (BHI)—a new tool built to track both improvement and decline in brain health. The BHI is a composite of about 20 metrics, including gold-standard tools such as the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index and the Oxford Happiness Questionnaire, as well as custom tasks designed to stress-test more complex thinking (Cook et al., 2026). “This battery of assessments produces insights into individual brain health and change over time,” said study author Dr. Lori Cook. Progress was measured not by competition with others, but against each participant’s own baseline.

One of the most surprising takeaways: the biggest gains were seen in people who started out with the lowest BHI scores. “Those who are starting at the lowest level appear to have the most opportunity for growth and may be coming in with more preexisting concerns,” Cook said. But even those who already scored high saw meaningful improvement (Cook et al., 2026).

The study’s message is clear: waiting until there’s a problem before taking care of your brain is outdated thinking. “Our brain is not defined by age—it is defined by possibility,” said Dr. Sandra Bond Chapman, senior author and director of the Center for BrainHealth (Chapman, 2026).

Perhaps as important, it wasn’t age, gender, or education that predicted who improved. The most important factor was engagement: people who participated regularly saw the biggest gains. The researchers do note that their sample wasn’t fully representative—most participants were white, female, and college-educated—so future research will need a broader pool (Cook et al., 2026).

CBH’s work doesn’t end here. The BrainHealth Project is still going, and about 400 Dallas-area participants have already undergone more than 1,200 brain scans to help researchers link changes in the BHI to what’s actually happening inside the brain (UT Dallas, 2026).

“There’s something powerful about knowing you can shape your own brain health,” said Cook. “That’s what we want people to take away—this isn’t just about maintenance. It’s about growth, at any age” (Cook et al., 2026).

References

  • The University of Texas at Dallas. (2026, June 13). Your brain can keep improving into your 90s, study finds. Link
  • Cook, L., Chapman, S.B., et al. (2026). Brain health can improve at any age: Results from a three-year longitudinal study. Scientific Reports.


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