Healthy lifestyle can boost your memory, study says

Forgot where you put your keys? Maybe you haven't been exercising and eating healthy lately.

Researchers at the University of California, Los Angeles found that regular exercise and eating well helped improve mild memory issues.

The study looked at 18,500 people between the ages of 18 and 99, surveying them about their memory and lifestyle choices such as smoking, diet and exercise.

Not unexpectedly, those who lived healthier lives had less memory issues than those who didn't.

Researchers were, however, surprised by the large number of younger people reporting memory troubles.

More from GlobalPost: Sun exposure is healthy, outweighs dangers of skin cancer, scientists say

They were also surprised by the finding that older adults tended to have healthier lifestyles than middle-aged and young people.

The study found that those who had the healthiest lifestyles were 75 percent less likely to report problems with memory, while that number was 21 percent for those who led the least healthy lives.

"We found that the more healthy lifestyle behaviors were practiced, the less likely one was to complain about memory issues," said senior study author Fernando Torres-Gil.

The study will be published in the journal International Psychogeriatrics.