Prompts that work when recall is patchy, grouped by how much they ask of the person. None of them is a memory test.
The questions that work are the ones with no wrong answer. Ask about feelings, senses, habits and opinions rather than dates, names and sequences, and start from something in front of them: a photograph, an object, a song. "What did your mother smell of?" is answerable on a bad day. "When did you move to the new house?" is not.
I am not a clinician and this is not care advice. These are conversation prompts from recording people’s life stories, nothing more. For anything about diagnosis, symptoms or care, ask the GP or memory service, and Alzheimer’s Society have practical material worth reading. The wider approach is on writing down a parent’s story when they have dementia.
Before you start
Three rules matter more than any question here.
Never say “do you remember”. Say “tell me about”. It sounds like a small change and it is the difference between an open door and a test.
Do not correct anything. Not a date, not a name, not the ending.
Take the answer you get, including the one that belongs to a different question.
Questions with no wrong answer
These ask for a feeling or an opinion, so they work on almost any day.
- What is your favourite time of day?
- Do you like the rain?
- What is a good cup of tea?
- Are you a dog person or a cat person?
- What smells nice?
- What makes you laugh?
- Do you like this song?
- Is that a good photograph?
- What should I be doing that I am not?
- Are you comfortable there?
Senses and the everyday
The deep grooves. Routines repeated for decades are often the last to go.
- What did your mother smell of?
- What was for tea on a Sunday?
- Who did the cooking?
- What did you have for your breakfast, back then?
- What was the walk to work like?
- What did you wear for best?
- What was the kitchen like?
- Was the house cold?
- What did you do on a Saturday?
- Who lived next door?
Work and doing
People who did one job for forty years can often describe it in detail long after other things have gone. Ask them to explain it to you as though you did not know how.
- How did you do that job? Show me.
- What tools did you use?
- Who trained you?
- Was the foreman fair?
- What time did you start?
- Who did you have your lunch with?
- What was the hardest part?
- Were you good at it?
Songs, places and people
- Do you know this one? (play it, and let them sing rather than answer)
- Where did you go dancing?
- Who was the best dancer?
- What was the name of that street?
- Who is this in the photograph?
- Was he a good man?
- Who was the funny one in your family?
- Who looked after everybody?
Through an object
Put the thing in their hands first, then ask. This works when nothing else does.
- What is this?
- Where did it come from?
- Whose was it?
- Should we keep it?
- Who should have it?
On a good day
Only when the conversation is already flowing, and let them go if they do not want to.
- What were you like when you were young?
- What was your mother like?
- How did you meet?
- What were you proud of?
- What would you tell them, if they were here?
- Is there anything you want me to know?
Questions to avoid
- Anything beginning “do you remember”.
- Dates, ages and years.
- “What year did we move?” and anything with one correct answer.
- Two questions in one sentence.
- Asking them to choose between more than two things.
- “Who am I?” Never as a test, and never in front of other people.
When an answer arrives from somewhere else
A question about a job produces an answer about a sister. Follow the sister.
You are recording a person talking, not filling a form. The answer that does not match the question is usually the one worth keeping.