Gotu Kola for Memory and Anxiety: A Human Evidence Review

What the evidence shows

Human research has not established reliable improvements in memory or attention from gotu kola.
A 2017 systematic review found no significant placebo-controlled benefit across cognitive domains.
Small studies reported changes in working memory, alertness, mood, or startle response, but these findings were narrow and not consistently replicated.
The main anxiety study lacked a clearly described placebo-controlled design, so its symptom improvements are difficult to interpret.
A 2025 trial in healthy boys compared gotu kola with Bacopa but did not include a placebo group.
Different extracts, populations, outcome measures, and study durations make the evidence difficult to generalize.

Bottom line: promising signals, not reliable proof

The current human evidence does not establish gotu kola as a reliable memory, attention, or anxiety intervention. A few small controlled studies reported favorable changes in selected laboratory measures, while an open-label anxiety study reported improvement on rating scales. However, the overall research base is small, uses different preparations and outcomes, and rarely tests people with clinically important cognitive or anxiety problems.

The most useful synthesis is a 2017 systematic review and meta-analysis. It included five randomized trials of Centella asiatica alone and six trials of products containing it. The review found no significant benefit over placebo across cognitive domains. It identified possible short-term improvements in alertness and anger, but the authors emphasized limitations involving product standardization, dosing regimens, and study quality. That conclusion remains a better guide than any single positive trial.

What human studies have actually tested

The clinical literature covers several distinct populations, and they should not be treated as interchangeable:

Healthy adults tested with an acute acoustic-startle task.
Healthy older adults tested with computerized memory tasks, event-related potentials, and mood scales.
Adults described as having generalized anxiety disorder in a small, non-placebo-controlled clinical study.
Healthy boys aged 8 to 10 in a newer comparison with Bacopa monnieri.
Small or early-phase studies focused on pharmacokinetics and tolerability rather than cognitive improvement.

These designs answer different questions. A change in startle amplitude is not the same as relief of persistent anxiety. Better performance on one working-memory task is not the same as improved everyday memory. Results from healthy children also cannot be generalized to adults, older people with cognitive impairment, or people with diagnosed anxiety conditions.

Memory and attention: what the trials found

The clearest positive signal comes from a double-blind, randomized, placebo-controlled study of 28 healthy older adults. Over roughly two months, the higher tested extract condition was associated with better working-memory performance and a change in the N100 event-related-potential measure; the study also reported improvements in self-rated mood. This was a small study, and the findings involved selected laboratory outcomes rather than a demonstrated improvement in daily cognitive function.

The broader systematic review did not find significant placebo-controlled improvements across cognitive domains. That matters because isolated positive results can arise from small samples, multiple outcome measures, or unusually responsive subgroups. The evidence therefore supports the statement that gotu kola has shown possible effects on selected cognitive tasks, not that it reliably improves memory or attention.

A 2025 double-blind randomized trial adds newer evidence but has important limits. It enrolled healthy boys aged 8 to 10 and compared a Centella preparation with Bacopa monnieri over about 90 days. Both groups improved on several memory and IQ measures, but there was no placebo or untreated control. The study therefore supports a comparative finding between two preparations more strongly than it supports an absolute claim that gotu kola improves cognition.

One randomized, double-blind study examined 40 healthy participants, split between gotu kola and placebo, using the acoustic startle response. Gotu kola reduced peak startle amplitude at two early time points, but it did not significantly change self-rated mood, heart rate, or blood pressure. This is a controlled human signal related to physiological reactivity, yet it is not evidence that the herb reduces generalized anxiety, panic, or other anxiety-disorder symptoms in ordinary life.

A separate clinical study followed 33 adults described as having generalized anxiety disorder. Participants received a Centella extract and completed psychological rating scales at baseline and during follow-up. The report described reductions in anxiety, stress, and related depressive symptoms, along with improved cognition. Its main weakness is design: the abstract does not describe randomization or a placebo comparison. Without a control group, improvements could reflect expectancy, regression to the mean, changes in concurrent care, or repeated testing.

Taken together, these studies justify further research into anxiety-related effects but do not establish clinical efficacy. The evidence is especially thin for long-term outcomes, functional improvement, relapse prevention, and comparisons with established anxiety treatments.

How strong is the evidence?

The controlled evidence is more informative than the uncontrolled evidence, but it is still too limited for a firm conclusion. The startle-response study used randomization and placebo control, and the older-adult memory study used a randomized, double-blind design. Those are meaningful strengths. Their small samples, short follow-up, specialized outcomes, and differing extracts reduce confidence that the findings will replicate or translate into everyday benefits.

The generalized-anxiety study is weaker because it lacks a clearly described control condition. The 2025 pediatric trial is larger than several earlier studies and used randomization and blinding, but its two-arm comparison cannot separate improvement caused by the intervention from normal development, practice effects, attention from researchers, or other time-related changes.

The systematic review also noted variation in plant preparation, standardization, and regimen. That heterogeneity makes it difficult to combine results and difficult to know whether findings from one extract apply to another product. The evidence is therefore best characterized as preliminary and hypothesis-generating.

What remains uncertain

Important questions remain unanswered:

Whether any cognitive effect is reproducible across independent, well-powered trials.
Whether benefits extend beyond selected tests to everyday memory, sustained attention, or academic and occupational functioning.
Whether adults with mild cognitive impairment or diagnosed anxiety disorders respond differently from healthy volunteers.
Which chemical profile or preparation, if any, is responsible for observed effects.
How long any effect lasts and whether it persists after the study period.
Whether rare or delayed adverse effects would emerge in larger and longer studies.

The lack of strong evidence is not proof that gotu kola has no biological effect. It means that current studies have not provided a dependable estimate of benefit, and they do not justify confident claims about preventing cognitive decline or treating anxiety.

Overall assessment

For memory and attention, human research shows isolated positive findings but no consistent placebo-controlled pattern across cognitive domains. For anxiety, one laboratory study found reduced startle reactivity in healthy volunteers, while a small uncontrolled study reported symptom improvement in adults with generalized anxiety disorder. Neither result is sufficient to establish a clinically meaningful anxiety benefit.

The most defensible conclusion is that gotu kola remains an investigational botanical for these uses. Future trials should preregister primary outcomes, use chemically characterized preparations, include credible placebo controls, recruit clinically relevant populations, measure functional outcomes, and follow participants long enough to assess durability and safety. Until then, claims of reliable memory enhancement, attention improvement, or anxiety relief go beyond what the human evidence can support.

Sources

About this article

NootroWorld publishes research summaries, not medical advice. This article describes what studies have and have not established; it does not tell you what to take. Supplements can interact with medication, pregnancy and existing health conditions, and study populations often differ from your own situation. Discuss any personal decision with a qualified healthcare professional.