I found this fun and informative article on brain care and couldn't help but to blog on it. It's a little bit of a sidetrack from the focus of brain training software but it's a pretty good read. I'll summarize some of the more interesting points from the article.
Smart Drugs
There is nothing too surprising here for most college students. "Smart Drugs" have been around for a while now and drugs like Ritalin and Vivance are no strangers to campuses nationwide. The varieties of drugs provide a remarkable increase in cognitive abilities. The article focuses on a drug called Modafinil which can keep people awake and on top of their game for 90 hours!! That's a lot of studying.
Food For Thought
This section provides a bunch of studies showing that what you eat can have a dramatic effect on how well you think. The idea behind this is that the brain needs certain nutrients to keep it running effectively, just like any muscle. The article recommends eating a good healthy breakfast, toast and beans. For lunch an omellete, salad, and yogurt are a good choice for deep thinking bloggers. The article also describes a cool little study where rats that were fed a "junk food" diet showed much lower performances in maze tests.
The Mozart Effect
Multiple studies have shown that classical music can improve people's spatial and mathematical reasoning. Even rats have shown to do better when given classical music instead of white noise before running a maze. The article brings up a good point that this increase may be just because people are relaxed after music. The article also mentions that of course a good way to gain an edge is to take some music lessons. Apparently Six-year old children who took music instead of other classes show an increase in IQ.
Gainful Employment
Probably this blogs most relevant section the article shares a few studies that show training a certain type of mental activity can increase your general intelligence. The article focuses on the idea of working memory and gives a few studies that show it how it can be improved. I'll blog about this in greater detail later, as it deserves much more attention.
Memory Marvels
Have you ever heard of the World Memory Championship? Neither did I. There are some cool strategies out there that allow people to memorize an incredible amount of information. One trick I've learned from a psychology class is to remember a grocery list mentally take a walk through a well known path while imagining each item located along the way. Try it, it works.
Sleep On It
We all know how poorly our brains seem to work on too little sleep. Interestingly enough very little is known about what happens in the brain during sleep or why animals even need to sleep. The article mentions that sleep may be a time for memory consolidation but little evidence is given.
Body and Mind
It turns out that physical exercise can increase the growth of new brain cells. In a study by Fred Gage he showed that one of the best ways for adults to gain brain cells is to do physical exercise. The article provides evidence of walking and yoga being good for you brain. It even mentions a study that shows mental how mental exercise can increase physical strength. The study showed that 15 minutes of thinking about being stronger increased strength by 13%. I'd like to see a little more information before I'm convinced of that.
Nuns On A Run
A covenant in Minnesota is a haven for good brain health. 678 sisters were entered in an Alzheimer's study which revealed an amazing group of individuals with great brain health. The reasons given in the article are the right amount of vitamin folate, mental activities (crossword puzzles), exercising, and a calm positive lifestyle.
Attention Seeking
It can be tough to sit down and focus on one thing in the high tech cell phone buzzing world we live in. One recommendation that was made was amphetamines and caffeine. Another recommendation for concentrating was music and even learning to recognize when you are getting off track.
Positive Feedback
I think that this was the coolest section of the article. The idea behind this technology is that the brain produces certain electromagnetic waves for different states of consciousness. Lots of different programs are being developed that show a person what kind of state of mind they are in. Training with this feedback eventually gives people the ability to stay in certain states for longer periods of time. Theoretically, this allows people to learn to concentrate harder and for longer periods of times. More scientific evidence is needed before this industry really explodes. For now though you can manage some really cool tricks.
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