Health

Are you doing enough to keep your brain healthy?

Sy Boles

Harvard Staff Writer

December 18, 2025

1 min read

Take our quiz to score your lifestyle’s potential for preventing diseases like dementia

Stroke, dementia, and late-life depression are more preventable than you might think — and they all share a set of common risk factors that can be addressed through lifestyle change. It’s a hopeful message, says Sanjula Singh, a faculty member at Harvard Medical School and Harvard-affiliated Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH), whose research showed that a higher result on the Brain Care Score was associated with a lower risk for all three conditions. Singh and her postdoctoral fellow Evy Martina Reinders helped us develop the following quiz based on their research into the modifiable lifestyle factors and 12 metrics tracked in the Brain Care Score that was developed at Harvard and MGH.

Step 1 of 7

14%

1. What share of dementia cases are attributable to modifiable risk factors?

10%

20%

30%

45%

2. Which risk factor most significantly increases the risk of brain disease?

Kidney disease

High cholesterol

High blood pressure

Insomnia

3. Which metric is NOT considered one of the risk factors for age-related brain disease?

Hearing loss

Blood sugar

Bone density

Cholesterol

4. Which of the following dietary habits are associated with better brain health?

Four to five servings of fruits and vegetables per day

Two servings of lean protein per day

Three or more servings of whole grains per day

All of the above

5. Why do many people educated about the benefits of healthy behaviors say they fail to engage in them?

Difficulty maintaining healthy habits over a long period of time

Financial problems

Being too busy

All of the above

6. How much physical activity should you minimally engage in weekly, according to the CDC?

At least 200 minutes of light physical activity

At least 60 minutes of moderate physical activity or at least 30 minutes per week of vigorous physical activity

At least 150 minutes of moderate activity or 75 minutes of vigorous aerobic activity

At least 100 minutes of vigorous aerobic activity

7. Improving your brain score by five points reduces the risk of dementia, stroke, and late-life depression by how much?

13%

20%

27%

38%

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