"I Remember the Fall": Memory of Falls in Older Adults

Objectives While there is a large body of research on falls and their consequences in older adults, little is known about how older adults remember them. We addressed this gap by inviting older adults to remember falls and control memories. Methods We analyzed specificity of memories and invited participants to rate emotional valence, mental time travel, visual imagery, importance, and rehearsal, as experienced during retrieval. Results Although analysis demonstrated no significant differences between memories of falls and control memories regarding specificity, participants rated memories of falls as more negative than control memories. Furthermore, they rated memories of falls as triggering higher mental time travel, higher visual imagery, higher importance, and higher rehearsal than control memories. Conclusions The negative emotional valence of memories of falls, as well as their ability to trigger significant levels of mental time travel, visual imagery, importance, and rehearsal, demonstrate how these memories are different from other memories in older adults. Clinical implications The findings demonstrate how falls can modulate memory of personal events in older adults.