Fun Questions to Ask Dementia Patients
Twenty short questions for visits with someone living with dementia. They lean on early memories, simple preferences and the senses rather than recent events, so there is no date to recall and no wrong answer.
The questions
Open any question for the note
What's your favorite song?
Why ask it
A short question with a short answer, which makes it a good place to start. Songs learned young are often retained when names and dates are not, and humming the first line yourself is usually enough for someone to join in. If no title comes, put the music on instead of repeating the question.
What did you like to play when you were small?
Why ask it
Childhood is the period most likely to remain reachable, so this asks for the easiest thing in the room. Answers are often physical: skipping, marbles, a bicycle, a river. Vague answers are fine, and a gesture counts as an answer.
What was your street like?
Why ask it
Places are often held longer than events, and a street can be described without any need to place it in time. Expect shops, neighbors, a hill, a particular noise. Avoid asking where it was, which turns the visit into a test.
Who was the best cook in your family?
Why ask it
Naming one person is easier than recalling a whole household, and the answer usually arrives with a dish attached. If the name is wrong or the person is someone else's relative, let it stand. Correcting it gains nothing and costs trust.
What did that kitchen smell like?
Why ask it
A sensory question rather than a factual one, so it can be answered from feeling alone. Bread, onions, coal, soap. Smell tends to unlock more than an outright request for a memory, and it works even when the earlier answer was thin.
What's your favorite color?
Why ask it
There is no way to get this wrong, which is the point. A question with no burden of recall gives someone a small experience of being certain, and it is a useful reset after anything that felt effortful.
What was your first job?
Why ask it
Early working life is often well preserved, and the answer frequently comes with wages, hours and a boss's name. Take whatever detail arrives and ask about that rather than checking the sequence of jobs afterwards.
What did you wear to work?
Why ask it
More concrete than asking what the work involved, and clothing anchors a whole period: a uniform, boots, a hat that was required. Someone who could not describe the job may still describe the coat.
Did you ever have a pet?
Why ask it
A yes or no question that opens onto a story if there is one, and closes gently if there is not. Animal names often surface easily. If the answer is no, ask which animals they like instead.
What kind of weather do you like best?
Why ask it
Answerable from the window, with no memory required at all. Keep questions like this in reserve for a difficult day, or for the point in a visit when recall has clearly become tiring.
What was your favorite holiday when you were young?
Why ask it
Holidays repeat, so they tend to be stored as a general impression rather than a single occasion, which makes them easier to reach. Be ready for the answer to turn sad if it involves people who have died, and follow the feeling rather than changing the subject.
Did you like to dance?
Why ask it
Short, and the answer is often in the face before it is in words. Dancing is tied to music and to a particular age, and a yes commonly leads to a hall, a band or a partner without any further prompting.
What did you like to wear when you went out?
Why ask it
Invites someone to describe themselves at their best, which is rare in a care setting where most questions are about needs. Answers are often precise about fabric, color and shoes long after other detail has gone.
Who made you laugh the most?
Why ask it
Asks for a person by feeling rather than by role, which is an easier route to a name. Watch what happens after: this question quite often produces the one story someone tells in full.
What's the best meal you ever had?
Why ask it
Food memories are usually specific, and the answer is a plate rather than an occasion. If the meal described is impossible or belongs to another era, go along with it. The accuracy is not what the question is for.
Where did you like to go on a day out?
Why ask it
A destination is a single item to retrieve, unlike a trip with a beginning and end. The sea, a market, a park, a relative's house. Ask what it looked like rather than when they last went.
What are you good at?
Why ask it
Present tense on purpose. Long illness erodes the sense of being competent at anything, and this offers it back without requiring recall. Any answer counts, including one about the present day rather than a former skill.
What flowers do you like?
Why ask it
Simple, and easy to act on afterwards by bringing some next time. Concrete preference questions like this also give a visitor something to do when conversation has run out and leaving early would feel abrupt.
What's been good about today?
Why ask it
Anchored in the present, so it does not require memory beyond the last few hours. Keep it near the end of a visit. If the answer is that nothing has been good, do not argue with it or try to improve the mood.
Is there anything you'd like to tell me?
Why ask it
An open close, and often the only point in a visit where the person sets the subject rather than answering someone else's questions. Silence is a reasonable answer. Wait longer than feels comfortable before filling it.
How to Use These Questions on a Visit
Practical guidance for the conversation itself
Asking
One question at a time, and keep it short
Two-part questions and questions with a clause in the middle are hard to hold. Say the whole question, then stop, then wait. Ten or fifteen seconds of silence is normal and is not a failure to understand.
Say tell me about, not do you remember
Do you remember sets up a test with a pass and a fail. Tell me about your street asks for whatever is available. The same information often arrives, without the moment of being caught out.
Offer two options when an open question stalls
If what kind of weather do you like gets nothing, try did you like the sun or the rain. Choosing between two things is easier than producing an answer from nothing, and it keeps the conversation with them.
Stay off recent events
Questions about lunch, the day of the week, visitors this morning or how long they have been here are the ones most likely to cause distress. Everything on this page is designed to avoid that ground.
Follow the detail you are given
If a name, a place or an object appears, ask about that rather than moving to the next question. One thread followed for ten minutes is a better visit than fifteen questions asked in order.
When an Answer Goes Somewhere Difficult
Do not correct a factual error
If a dead spouse is spoken of as living, or a childhood home as the current one, arguing the point causes distress without changing the belief. Respond to what the person is feeling and stay with the subject they raised.
Let sadness happen
Some of these questions reach people who are gone. Grief is an appropriate response and does not mean the question was a mistake. Sit with it, say something plain such as you must have been close, and do not rush to lighten the mood.
Change register, not subject, if agitation starts
Rising distress is a signal to stop asking questions rather than to ask a different one. Move to something present and sensory: a hand held, music, a window, a drink. Return to conversation only if they lead.
Tell staff or family what worked
A song title, a first job, the name of a sister who made them laugh. Passing these on means the next person does not start from nothing, and they are genuinely useful to care staff.
Practical Notes
- Sit at eye level, close enough to be heard without raising your voice, and face them so your expression is visible.
- Turn off the television and close the door if you can. Background noise makes following a question much harder.
- Visit earlier in the day if there is a choice. Many people are more confused and more tired in the late afternoon and evening.
- Bring something to hold: photographs, a music player, a familiar object from the house. An object gives the conversation somewhere to go.
- Keep visits short and repeat them. Twenty minutes twice a week is usually easier than two hours once a month.
- Introduce yourself by name and relationship each time, plainly and without making a point of it.
- Say goodbye clearly rather than slipping out, and if you plan to come back, say so.