Cognitive function improvement methods -
in clinical psychology from Pennsylvania State University in He sees clinical psychology as a practical extension of philosophy and specializes in neuropsychology — having been board-certified in Jeffrey is currently Clinical Director at Metrowest Neuropsychology in Westborough, MA.
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The Neuroscientist , 16 5 , — Warthon-Medina, M. Like I said, it would be impractical to constantly practice the dual n-back task or variations thereof every day for the rest of your life to reap cognitive benefits.
These can be implemented every day, to get you the benefits of intense entire-brain training, and should transfer to gains in overall cognitive functioning as well. Any one of these things by itself is great, but if you really want to function at your absolute cognitive best, you should do all five, and as often as possible.
In fact, I live my life by these five principles. If you adopt these as fundamental guidelines, I guarantee you will be performing at your peak ability, surpassing even what you believe you are capable of— all without artificial enhancement.
Best part: Science supports these principles by way of data! It is no coincidence that geniuses like Einstein were skilled in multiple areas, or polymaths, as we like to refer to them.
Geniuses are constantly seeking out novel activities, learning a new domain. There is only one trait out of the "Big Five" from the Five Factor Model of personality Acronym: OCEAN, or Openness, Conscientiousness, Extroversion, Agreeableness, and Neuroticism that correlates with IQ, and it is the trait of Openness to new experience.
People who rate high on Openness are constantly seeking new information, new activities to engage in, new things to learn—new experiences in general [2].
When you seek novelty, several things are going on. First of all, you are creating new synaptic connections with every new activity you engage in. These connections build on each other, increasing your neural activity, creating more connections to build on other connections—learning is taking place.
An area of interest in recent research [pdf] is neural plasticity as a factor in individual differences in intelligence. Plasticity is referring to the number of connections made between neurons, how that affects subsequent connections, and how long-lasting those connections are.
Basically, it means how much new information you are able to take in, and if you are able to retain it, making lasting changes to your brain. Constantly exposing yourself to new things helps puts your brain in a primed state for learning.
Novelty also triggers dopamine I have mentioned this before in other posts , which not only kicks motivation into high gear, but it stimulates neurogenesis—the creation of new neurons—and prepares your brain for learning.
All you need to do is feed the hunger. This particular dopamine receptor, the D1 type, is associated with neural growth and development, among other things. This increase in plasticity , allowing greater binding of this receptor, is a very good thing for maximizing cognitive functioning.
Take home point: Be an "Einstein". Always look to new activities to engage your mind—expand your cognitive horizons. Learn an instrument. Take an art class. Go to a museum. Read about a new area of science. Be a knowledge junkie. There are absolutely oodles of terrible things written and promoted on how to "train your brain" to "get smarter".
I'm going to shatter some of that stuff you've previously heard about brain training games. Here goes: They don't work. Individual brain training games don't make you smarter —they make you more proficient at the brain training games.
Now, they do serve a purpose, but it is short-lived. The key to getting something out of those types of cognitive activities sort of relates to the first principle of seeking novelty. Once you master one of those cognitive activities in the brain-training game, you need to move on to the next challenging activity.
Figure out how to play Sudoku? Now move along to the next type of challenging game. There is research that supports this logic. A few years ago, scientist Richard Haier wanted to see if you could increase your cognitive ability by intensely training on novel mental activities for a period of several weeks.
They used the video game Tetris as the novel activity, and used people who had never played the game before as subjects I know—can you believe they exist?! What they found, was that after training for several weeks on the game Tetris, the subjects experienced an increase in cortical thickness, as well as an increase in cortical activity, as evidenced by the increase in how much glucose was used in that area of the brain.
Basically, the brain used more energy during those training times, and bulked up in thickness—which means more neural connections, or new learned expertise—after this intense training. And they became experts at Tetris. Cool, right? However, they remained just as good at Tetris; their skill did not decrease.
The brain scans showed less brain activity during the game-playing, instead of more, as in the previous days. Why the drop? Their brains got more efficient. Once their brain figured out how to play Tetris, and got really good at it, it got lazy.
Efficiency is not your friend when it comes to cognitive growth. In order to keep your brain making new connections and keeping them active, you need to keep moving on to another challenging activity as soon as you reach the point of mastery in the one you are engaging in. You want to be in a constant state of slight discomfort, struggling to barely achieve whatever it is you are trying to do, as Einstein alluded to in his quote.
This keeps your brain on its toes, so to speak. When I say thinking creatively will help you achieve neural growth, I am not talking about painting a picture, or doing something artsy, like we discussed in the first principle, Seeking Novelty.
When I speak of creative thinking, I am talking about creative cognition itself, and what that means as far as the process going on in your brain. Contrary to popular belief, creative thinking does not equal "thinking with the right side of your brain".
It involves recruitment from both halves of your brain, not just the right. In order to do this well, you need both right and left hemispheres working in conjunction with each other. Several years ago, Dr Robert Sternberg , former Dean at Tufts University, opened the PACE Psychology of Abilities, Competencies, and Expertise Center, in Boston.
Sternberg has been on a quest to not only understand the fundamental concept of intelligence, but also to find ways in which any one person can maximize his or her intelligence through training, and especially, through teaching in schools. As part of a research study, The Rainbow Project [pdf], he created not only innovative methods of creative teaching in the classroom, but generated assessment procedures that tested the students in ways that got them to think about the problems in creative and practical ways, as well as analytical, instead of just memorizing facts.
He wanted to find out if by teaching students to think creatively and practically about a problem, as well as for memory, he could get them to i Learn more about the topic, ii Have more fun learning, and iii Transfer that knowledge gained to other areas of academic performance.
He wanted to see if by varying the teaching and assessment methods, he could prevent "teaching to the test" and get the students to actually learn more in general. He collected data on this, and boy, did he get great results. In a nutshell? On average, the students in the test group the ones taught using creative methods received higher final grades in the college course than the control group taught with traditional methods and assessments.
But—just to make things fair— he also gave the test group the very same analytical-type exam that the regular students got a multiple choice test , and they scored higher on that test as well.
That means they were able to transfer the knowledge they gained using creative, multimodal teaching methods, and score higher on a completely different cognitive test of achievement on that same material. Sound familiar? I mentioned earlier that efficiency is not your friend if you are trying to increase your intelligence.
Unfortunately, many things in life are centered on trying to make everything more efficient. This is so we can do more things, in a shorter amount of time, expending the least amount of physical and mental energy possible.
Take one object of modern convenience, GPS. GPS is an amazing invention. I am one of those people GPS was invented for. My sense of direction is terrible. I get lost all the time. So when GPS came along, I was thanking my lucky stars. But you know what?
After using GPS for a short time, I found that my sense of direction was worse. If I failed to have it with me, I was even more lost than before. So when I moved to Boston—the city that horror movies and nightmares about getting lost are modeled after—I stopped using GPS.
I had a new job which involved traveling all over the burbs of Boston, and I got lost every single day for at least 4 weeks. I got lost so much, I thought I was going to lose my job due to chronic lateness I even got written up for it.
But—in time, I started learning my way around, due to the sheer amount of practice I was getting at navigation using only my brain and a map. I began to actually get a sense of where things in Boston were, using logic and memory, not GPS. I can still remember how proud I was the day a friend was in town visiting, and I was able to effectively find his hotel downtown with only a name and a location description to go on—not even an address.
It was like I had graduated from navigational awareness school. Technology does a lot to make things in life easier, faster, more efficient, but sometimes our cognitive skills can suffer as a result of these shortcuts, and hurt us in the long run.
Not a big deal. Your overall health will probably decline as a result. Your brain needs exercise as well. If you stop using your problem-solving skills, your spatial skills, your logical skills, your cognitive skills—how do you expect your brain to stay in top shape—never mind improve? Think about modern conveniences that are helpful, but when relied on too much, can hurt your skill in that domain.
Translation software: amazing, but my multilingual skills have declined since I started using it more. Same goes for spell-check and autocorrect. In fact, I think autocorrect was one of the worst things ever invented for the advancement of cognition. You know the computer will catch your mistakes, so you plug along, not even thinking about how to spell any more.
As a result of years of relying on autocorrect and spell-check, as a nation, are we worse spellers? I would love someone to do a study on this. There are times when using technology is warranted and necessary.
Walking to work every so often or taking the stairs instead of the elevator a few times a week is recommended to stay in good physical shape. Lay off the GPS once in a while, and do your spatial and problem-solving skills a favor.
Keep it handy, but try navigating naked first. Your brain will thank you. And that brings us to the last element to maximize your cognitive potential: Networking. If not, start. By networking with other people—either through social media such as Facebook or Twitter, or in face-to-face interactions—you are exposing yourself to the kinds of situations that are going to make objectives much easier to achieve.
By exposing yourself to new people, ideas, and environments, you are opening yourself up to new opportunities for cognitive growth. Being in the presence of other people who may be outside of your immediate field gives you opportunities to see problems from a new perspective, or offer insight in ways that you had never thought of before.
Learning is all about exposing yourself to new things and taking in that information in ways that are meaningful and unique—networking with other people is a great way to make that happen.
Steven Johnson , author who wrote the book "Where Good Ideas Come From", discusses the importance of groups and networks for the advancement of ideas.
If you are looking for ways to seek out novel situations, ideas, environments, and perspectives, then networking is the answer.
It would be pretty tough to implement this "Get Smarter" regiment without making networking a primary component. Greatest thing about networking: Everyone involved benefits.
Collective intelligence for the win! Remember back to the beginning of this article where I told the story about my clients with autism spectrum disorders? Why were those children able to achieve at such a high level? It was not by chance or miracle—it was because we incorporated all of these learning principles into their therapy program.
While most other therapy providers were stuck in the " Errorless Learning " paradigm and barely-modified " Lovaas Techniques " of Applied Behavior Analysis, we adopted and fully embraced a multimodal approach to teaching.
Cognitive function improvement methods Cherry, MS, is ffunction psychosocial rehabilitation specialist, Gut-brain connection educator, and author of Revitalize "Everything Psychology Book. Flavonoids as natural pain relievers training is an approach that impeovement to sharpen or maintain brain functions through the use of improvemrnt mental activities. These mental activities are intended to help cognitive abilities such as working memory, executive function, and problem-solving abilities. There is a long-standing notion that playing brain games, such as puzzles and memorization activities, can help stave off the negative effects of aging. But is the old "use it or lose it" adage Cognitivw true? Do these cognitive games really have Cognktive sort of impact on mental functioning? Throughout Calorie intake guide Cognitive function improvement methods, our brains are changing; new neurons or nerve cells, these use Cognigive impulses and chemical signals to act as messengers between different regions in our improvemenr and between our brain miprovement body and synapses connections between neurons that allow for metgods sending Cognitive function improvement methods information continue Cognitkve develop as we meyhods accumulate new experiences Cognitive function improvement methods accrue more knowledge into our mental piggy-bank. Actions we take can affect the development of synapses and lead to cognitive enhancement. According to a report by the Global Council on Brain Health, continuing to actively develop our cognition through diverse and engaging activities can improve a range of brain functions. The National Institute on Aginga leader in healthy-aging research, states that diverse lifestyle changes focused on enhancing cognitive development, may improve memory, concentration, information processing, and motor function. In a recent report from the World Health Organization, an estimated 55 million people are currently living with dementia. In addition, the WHO also predicts that this number will rise to 78 million by and million by While research is still underway to determine if focus on cognitive enhancement can prevent dementia later in life, performing stimulating and diverse activities with consistency during our lifetime has been shown to delay the onset of dementia by five years.
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