Forget About It! Why New Yorkers Are Officially Losing Their Minds (And Their Keys)

And here I was thinking it was just "mom brain."

As it turns out, my inability to find my sunglasses while they are literally sitting on top of my head isn’t a personal flaw; it’s just a New York thing.

A fascinating new study by the team at Duelbits just ranked every state in America to find out who has the absolute worst memory. And guess what? The Empire State snagged the bronze medal.

That's right, New Yorkers have officially been crowned the third most absent-minded people in the entire country, scoring a whopping 73.59 out of 100 on the forgetfulness scale. So, if you’ve spent the morning tearing your apartment apart looking for something you were holding two minutes ago, take comfort. It’s a statewide epidemic.

The "Find My Phone" Capital of the Northeast

According to the data, New Yorkers made over 3.6 million Google searches for lost or misplaced items over the last year. To break that down into embarrassing specifics, that includes 486,000 frantic searches for "find my phone" and another 416,280 searches for "lost keys."

We also realized we needed to replace a driver’s license nearly 194,000 times, and had over 36,000 moments of pure, ice-cold panic involving a missing passport. Oh, and we searched for forgotten passwords over 186,000 times. Honestly, at this point, auto-fill is the only thing keeping our entire lives from completely unraveling.

Blame it on the Sleep (or Lack Thereof) and Twitter Stress

Why are our brains operating like a dial-up internet connection? Shockingly, it might have something to do with the fact that we live in the city that never sleeps, and a state that apparently never naps.

The study found that over 38% of New Yorkers get less than seven hours of sleep a night, which is the ninth-worst rate in the nation. On top of that, we are stressed out of our minds. Researchers analyzed local tweets and found that over 43% of them practically screamed "anxiety," putting us well above the national average. High stress plus low sleep equals remembering absolutely nothing.

Sorry I Didn't Text You Back, I'm a New Yorker

If you are currently waiting for a text back from a New Yorker, don’t take it personally. The data shows we forget to reply to an average of about nine messages every single day. Amazingly, that is actually one of our better stats.

In California, which took the number one spot as the most forgetful state in America, people leave 15 messages unread every day. Nevada came in second place, probably because they are completely distracted by the three and a half gallons of alcohol they consume per person each year. So hey, we might be forgetful, but at least we aren’t California.

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Who Else is in the Forgetful Club?

Just in case you want to see who else is struggling to remember their own ZIP code, the rest of the top ten list is pretty wild. Right behind us in fourth place is Georgia, where sleep deprivation is hitting them hard, followed by Colorado in fifth, where locals are drowning in 15 unread messages a day and high stress levels.

The bottom half of the top ten includes Alabama in sixth place, Texas in seventh, and North Carolina in eighth. Wrapping up the list of America's most scatterbrained states are Florida at number nine and Maryland at number ten.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go look for my wallet. I'm almost positive I left it in the fridge.