The second Friday of January is notoriously known as "Quitter's Day," but science says sticking to the rhythm of this new habit matters.
If motivation for your New Year’s resolution has dropped faster than the ball in Times Square, statistics show you’re not alone. According to 2024 data from Forbes Health, most people keep a resolution for just under four months. And the second Friday of January marks “Quitter’s Day”—the day by which many Americans abandon their best intentions for the new year.
That said, it’s not too late to reassess your selection, and doctors have a suggestion about what to try. As Trisha Parischa, MD, MPH, an assistant professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School, recently explained in The Washington Post, taking up one particularly fun habit in the new year could dramatically cut your dementia risk.
Citing decades of research, she says dancing may deserve top billing when it comes to a new annual goal. “People who danced more than once a week had a 76% lower risk of getting dementia compared to people who danced less frequently or who didn’t dance at all,” she says.
The striking figure comes from long-running research that began in the 1980s. Scientists from the Albert Einstein College of Medicine followed older adults living in the Bronx borough in New York City, tracking how often they engaged in physically or mentally stimulating activities. While pastimes such as playing musical instruments or board games were associated with a lower dementia risk, the activity of dancing stood out above all others, Dr. Parscha says.
Researchers believe dance is uniquely protective because it engages the brain on multiple levels at the same time. As Dr. Parischa explains: “You’re keeping rhythm, you’re trying to remember all those dance moves, maybe you’re inventing some new ones, you’re navigating your space, and maybe you’re even responding to your partner’s cues.”
She adds that dancing blends aerobic exercise with balance training, memory, creativity, and social interaction—elements that are each independently linked to better cognitive health. That combination may help strengthen neural connections and build cognitive resilience as we age.
Music may also play a meaningful role in motivating you to stick to dance long-term, lighting up your brain’s pleasure center and encouraging repeat performances. “There’s no question, anecdotally at least, that music has a very stimulating effect on physical activity,” Daniel Tarsy, MD, a Harvard Medical School professor of neurology told Harvard Health Publishing. Dr. Tarsy, also the director of the Parkinson’s Disease and Movement Disorders Center at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, notes that dancing is so beneficial for the brain that it is now used in the treatment of Parkinson’s disease.
Dr. Parischa offers her take: “My 2026 advice for you is that if you are choosing between a walk and a dance break, pick the one that’s going to make you smile.”
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