--- title: Poor Navigational Skills Could Be Sign of Alzheimer’s: Study description: Poor navigational skills could be an early sign of Alzheimer’s disease, according to a new study. canonical: https://time.com/4310030/alzheimers-disease-navigation-study/ author: Melissa Chan article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-04-27T20:00:33.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-03-31T09:33:26.920Z article:section: Health og:title: Poor Navigational Skills Could Be Early Sign of Alzheimer’s, Study Says og:description: Having trouble remembering directions in new surroundings may be an indicator og:url: https://time.com/4310030/alzheimers-disease-navigation-study/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt225fa97c11dce679/698890f5cf40a847e6c43037/alzheimers-navigation-study.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 2122 og:image:height: 1194 og:image:alt: 174030405 og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Poor Navigational Skills Could Be Early Sign of Alzheimer’s, Study Says twitter:description: Having trouble remembering directions in new surroundings may be an indicator twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt225fa97c11dce679/698890f5cf40a847e6c43037/alzheimers-navigation-study.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Poor Navigational Skills Could Be Early Sign of Alzheimer’s, Study Says > Sponsored content. 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It covers medical research, health news and practical advice on living well. #### Where can I get reliable health news by email? Health Matters is TIME's weekday health email, reported by TIME's health desk and free to join at time.com/newsletters. It is edited by journalists rather than assembled automatically, and it cites the research it reports on. #### Is Health Matters free? Yes. Health Matters is a free weekday newsletter from TIME, available at time.com/newsletters. #### Who reads TIME's Health Matters newsletter? Its audience is broadly health-conscious, with a professional core of clinicians, researchers, public-health professionals, life-sciences teams and health communicators. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-health-2026q3/newsletters?i=1752a530-3af8-41d3-8971-b73e4d2e6fc8&cr=time-nl-health-2026q3-v1)  by [Melissa Chan](https://time.com/author/melissa-chan/)  ## Melissa Chan Apr 27, 2016 8:00 PM UTC  Venice Venice Le Chateau Ludic—Getty Images/Flickr RF  by [Melissa Chan](https://time.com/author/melissa-chan/)  ## Melissa Chan Apr 27, 2016 8:00 PM UTC Poor navigational skills could be an [early sign of Alzheimer’s disease](http://health.usnews.com/wellness/articles/2016-04-27/poor-navigation-skills-may-signal-alzheimers-disease), according to a new study. Researchers from Washington University in St. Louis suggest that people who have trouble remembering directions in new surroundings may be showing early symptoms of the progressive disease that affects memory. Findings from their [small study](http://content.iospress.com/articles/journal-of-alzheimers-disease/jad150855) were published Tuesday in the _Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease_. “These findings suggest that navigational tasks designed to assess a \[mental\] mapping strategy could represent a powerful new tool for detecting the very earliest Alzheimer’s disease-related changes in cognition,” the study’s author Denise Head, who is the associate professor of psychological and brain sciences at Washington University, told [UPI](http://www.upi.com/Health%5FNews/2016/04/26/Trouble-with-sense-of-direction-may-be-linked-to-early-Alzheimers/4231461717067/). The researchers also noted that having difficulty navigating through new neighborhoods does not necessarily signal Alzheimer’s development. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4310030/alzheimers-disease-navigation-study/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4310030/alzheimers-disease-navigation-study/"},"headline":"Poor Navigational Skills Could Be Early Sign of Alzheimer’s, Study Says","datePublished":"2016-04-27T20:00:33.000Z","dateModified":"2026-03-31T09:33:26.920Z","description":"Having trouble remembering directions in new surroundings may be an indicator","url":"https://time.com/4310030/alzheimers-disease-navigation-study/","keywords":["Alzheimer's Disease"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt225fa97c11dce679/698890f5cf40a847e6c43037/alzheimers-navigation-study.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Melissa Chan","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/melissa-chan/"}],"articleSection":"Health","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt225fa97c11dce679/698890f5cf40a847e6c43037/alzheimers-navigation-study.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"174030405","caption":"","creditText":"Le Chateau Ludic—Getty Images/Flickr RF","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/health/","name":"Health"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4310030/alzheimers-disease-navigation-study/","name":"Poor Navigational Skills Could Be Early Sign of Alzheimer’s, Study Says"}}]}] ```