How to Keep Improving Your Brain Into Your 90s

Key takeaways

• In nearly 4,000 adults ages 19 to 94, brief daily brain‑training activities were linked to measurable gains in a composite BrainHealth Index over three years.

• Improvements showed up at every age, including in people in their 80s and 90s, and those who started with the lowest scores improved the most.

• Engagement with the training, not age, sex, or education, was the strongest predictor of progress, suggesting brain health can be actively cultivated across adulthood.

A new three‑year study from the University of Texas at Dallas’ Center for BrainHealth challenges the idea that getting older must mean growing mentally duller. Researchers followed 3,966 adults, ages 19 to 94, who spent just 5 to 15 minutes a day on structured brain‑training activities and tracked how their brain health changed over time.

The work drew on the BrainHealth Project, a large ongoing initiative launched in 2020 to study how everyday habits and targeted training can build and maintain brain health throughout life. Rather than waiting for problems to emerge, the project treats brain health more like fitness—something that can be cultivated proactively.

How brain health was measured

To capture change, the team used the BrainHealth Index (BHI), a patent‑pending assessment developed at the Center for BrainHealth. The BHI combines around 20 measures into three domains: clarity (complex thinking and cognitive performance), emotional balance, and connectedness to people and purpose.

It blends widely used questionnaires—such as the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index and the Oxford Happiness Questionnaire—with custom tasks designed to tap higher‑order thinking skills. Instead of comparing people to one another, the index focuses on each person’s trajectory, looking at how their own scores shift over time.

Gains at every age, with the biggest jumps in lower scorers

Across the three‑year period, participants showed improvements on the BrainHealth Index regardless of age group. Positive shifts were seen even among adults in their 80s and 90s, suggesting that it is not too late in later life to see benefits from targeted mental practices.

Those who started with the lowest BHI scores experienced the largest gains.
Researchers speculate that this group may have had more room to grow and may also have been more motivated to stick with the program because of preexisting concerns about their brain health.

Engagement mattered more than demographics

One of the clearest signals from the study was that how actively people engaged with the training predicted improvement far better than age, sex, or education level. Participants who consistently completed the short, daily activities tended to make more progress, regardless of where they started demographically.

At the same time, the study sample was not fully representative of the general population: most participants were white, female, and college-educated.

The researchers note that they are working to broaden participation so future findings can speak more confidently to diverse communities.

A brain defined by possibility, not age

The authors emphasize that the data align with what is known about neuroplasticity—the brain’s capacity to adapt structurally and functionally throughout life. They argue that brain health should be seen less as something to “protect” only when trouble appears, and more as a dimension of health people can actively shape.

As part of the same project, a subgroup of roughly 400 local participants has undergone more than 1,200 brain scans, creating a large imaging dataset that will help researchers link BrainHealth Index changes to underlying neural patterns. These ongoing imaging studies aim to clarify which brain networks change alongside improvements in clarity, emotional balance, and sense of purpose.

References:

1. Lori G. Cook, Jeffrey S. Spence, Zhengsi Chang, Erin E. Venza, Aaron Tate, Ian H. Robertson, Mark D’Esposito, Geoffrey S. F. Ling, Jane G. Wigginton, Sandra Bond Chapman. Measuring and increasing the brain health span across adulthood: a public health imperative. Scientific Reports, 2026; DOI: 10.1038/s41598-026-51403-3