GPS and Dementia

GPS is great, it saves time, gas, and in the process helps the environment but too much of a good thing can have its costs also.

From MSNBC...

[Non-GPS users] were shown on fMRI images to have increased activity in the hippocampus, an area of the brain believed to be involved in memory and navigation and play a role in finding shortcuts and new routes.

The take-away message isn't to rip your GPS from the dashboard. Rather be smart about it, says Bohbot, noting that building cognitive maps takes “time and effort.” Her suggestion is to use GPS to get to a new destination, but to turn it off on the way back or when going to familiar locations.

"We live in a society that's so fast paced that it encourages us to feel bad if we get lost," says Bohbot, fearing that reduced use of spatial strategies may lead to earlier onset of dementia. "What I say to people is that we can use GPS to explore the environment, but don't become dependent on it. (Developing) a cognitive map may take longer, but it’s worth the investment.”