SharpBrains

Over the last few weeks I have been reading Recollections of My Life, the impressive autobiography by Santiago Ramon y Cajal (1852-1934), one the founders of modern neuroscience. The book combines a very lively window into his childhood, life and personal reflections, with a pretty technical descriptions at times of his main contributions to neuroscience.

I wanted to understand his views better because, on the one hand, he is often presented as one of the first proponents of the No New Neurons (in the adult brain) dogma now refuted,  but on the other hand he said things like "Every man can, of he so desires, become the sculptor of his own brain", thereby emphasizing what we now call adult neuroplasticity (the ability of the brain to rewire itself through experience).

Let me share some of the quotes I have enjoyed the most:

*** (on his traits of character): "a profound belief in the sovereign will; faith in work; the conviction that a persevering and deliberate effort is capable of moulding and organizing everything, from the muscle to the brain, making up the deficiencies of nature and even overcoming the mischances of character-the most difficult thing in life."

- Comment:  very clear belief in neuroplasticity-which he couldn't prove in his lifetime given lack of the technical resources and accumulated knowledge available today.

*** "...I am a fervent adept of the religion of facts. It has been said innumerable times, and I have also repeated it, that "facts remain and theories pass away...To observe without thinking is as dangerous as to think without observing. Theory is our best intellectual tool; a tool, like all others, liable to be notched and to rust, requiring continual repairs and replacements, but without which it would be almost impossible to make a deep hollow in the marble block of reality"

- Comment:  beautiful display of the scientific mindset.

*** (after a first disillusionment) "I consoled myself then in the way that I have always been in the habit of doing...namely by bathing my soul in nature...For one who is capable of appreciating its enchantment, the country is the sovereign soother of emotions, the unreplaceable commutator of thoughts."

- Comment:  I was surprised by the lyrical nature of several passages in his autobiography, like this one. When Howard Gartner talks of a "naturalistic intelligence", he may well be thinking of attitudes like Cajal's. Which makes much sense, given the quote above on the value of "facts".

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Major Implications from Brain Research

Should Social-Emotional Learning Be Part of Academic Curriculum?: It is clear by now that our brains are more than cognitive machines. For example, emotions can either enhance or inhibit our ability to learn. Daniel Goleman explores the implications of "new studies that reveal how teaching kids to be emotionally and socially competent boost their academic achievement." Brought to you in partnership with Greater Good Magazine.

Retain older workers beyond retirement: BusinessWeek covers a best practice in a topic of growing importance: how large companies, such as American Express, can retain older workers in productive ways beyond a set arbitrary retirement age. As Dr. Art Kramer told us recently, "as a society, it is a massive waste of talent not to ensure older adults remain active and productive."

BrainTech and Sustainable Brains: Building on a recent quote by John Doerr about clean technology trends, we wonder... "If Energy is the mother of all markets...who would be the father of all markets?" The Human Brain, perhaps?

Health and Research

What You Can do to Improve Memory (and Why It Deteriorates in Old Age): Is there anything we can do besides "exercise like crazy, eat healthy foods that you don't like all that much, pop your statin pills, and take up yoga?" Yes: focus, focus, focus, suggests Dr. Bill Klemm.

News and Events

Cognitive Health News August 2008: This is a roundup of recent brain health news and our commentary, including the growing adoption of Dakim and Nintendo products, the cognitive impact of videogames, and the cognitive dimension of the obesity crisis.

Exercise your brain at these events: Alvaro will present the main findings from our market research at multiple conferences in the US, Canada and Dubai during the rest of  the year.

Where does the "Feeling of Knowing" comes from?: Dr. Ginger Campbell shares some insights from her recent interview with neurologist Robert Burton (author of On Being Certain: Believing You Are Right Even When You're Not)."While it might be true that one can learn to become more aware of the emotional signals coming from one’s body, Dr. Burton argues that “gut feelings” or intuition should not be assumed to be true without testing."

Resources for Brain Health Across the Lifespan: Laurie Bartels shares a list of interviews, video, articles, and books that go hand-in-hand with the brain-related topics we cover.

Brain teaser

Can you use mental self rotation to read a map?: please check out this teaser by Dr. Pascale Michelon, one of our favorites so far.

We hope you have enjoyed this newsletter. We encourage you to stay tuned for our September editions, since great content is coming. We will soon publish an interview with Lee Woodruff, co-author of the book In An Instant: A Family's Journey of Love and Healing, and discuss the spectacular cognitive recovery of her husband, ABC reporter Bob Woodruff, who experienced a traumatic brain injury in Iraq in 2006. We will also interview Dr. Mike Posner, eminent cognitive neuroscientist, to explore recent findings on attention and attention training and their implications.

Here you have a roundup of interesting recent news on cognitive health topics and my commentary:

1) Playing Video Games Offers Learning Across Life Span, Say Studies

2) Mental Floss at Military Officer Magazine

3) Brain Training dominates '08 Euro sales (CVG Online)

4) Dakim’s [m]Power Adopted by 150 Senior Living Communities ... (Business Wire)

5) Clumsy kids more likely to become obese adults: study (CBC)

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1) There were a few interesting research papers presented at the last  American Psychological Association conventions around the theme:

Playing Video Games Offers Learning Across Life Span, Say Studies
--Skills Transfer to Classroom, Surgical Procedures, Scientific Thinking (press release).

Probably the most interesting study was that of 303 laparoscopic surgeons, which "showed that surgeons who played video games requiring spatial skills and hand dexterity and then performed a drill testing these skills were significantly faster at Continue Reading »

Welcome to the 186th edition of the Carnival of Education, the weekly virtual gathering of dozens of bloggers to discuss all things education.

Q: Why do you say this edition is "brain-based"?
A: Because the Q&A frame we are using is inspired by how Chris at Ouroboros recently hosted Encephalon Brain and Mind blog carnival. (Is classic Greek making a comeback?).

Q: As educators, what inspires us to do what we do?
A: Tracy suggests, "Hope for the future".

Q: And what may happen in the future?
A: Eric proposes that the field can learn much about how athletes train their minds and bodies to maximize performance.

Q: What should not happen in the future?
A: Dave hopes we stop the Textbook Insanity, killing trees to create books not everyone uses.

Q: What comes first, subject or learner?
A: Bogusia has "switched sides". She now centers her teaching around her students, to make sure they appreciate the beauty of the subject.

Q: How do you know if something is developmentally appropriate? 
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As promised in my previous post on Neurogenesis and Brain Plasticity in Adult Brains, I will now list some interviews, video, articles, and books that go hand-in-hand with these fascinating topics we are discussing. Please comment below if you have favorite additional resources!

NEUROGENESIS

MIT news – Picower researcher finds neuron growth in adult brain

Society for Neuroscience brain brief – Adult Neurogenesis

BRAIN PLASTICITY

Neuroscience for Kids – Brain Plasticity: What Is It?

Society for Neuroscience brain brief – Brain Plasticity, Language Processing and Reading

Brain Science Podcast – Ginger Campbell interview with Norman Doidge, MD, Continue Reading »

BusinessWeek covers a best practice in a topic of growing importance: how large companies can retain older workers in productive ways beyond a set arbitrary retirement age.

Issue: Retiring Employees, Lost Knowledge (Business Week)
A pilot program at American Express gives soon-to-be retirees less work and more time to pass along their expertise to younger generations

- "Before long, the group made an important discovery: Not only would a huge number of employees become eligible for retirement in the next five to 10 years, the company had done little to retain the wealth of institutional knowledge they would be taking with them. From the intricacies of key client relationships to mainframe computer languages no longer being taught in school, many experienced workers possessed critical know-how that, if lost, would be costly—if not impossible—for the company to replace."

- "These parameters helped shape the American Express phased-retirement program, an initiative launched in pilot mode during Continue Reading »

Here are the dates and locations of some upcoming events where I will be presenting. Please introduce yourself if you are attending!

>> September 4-5th, San Francisco, CA: several Brain Health Promotion sessions, at the American Society on Aging conference.

>> October 9th, Vancouver, Canada: Exercising Our Brains 101 and Navigating The Brain Fitness Maze, at the British Columbia Seniors Living Association annual conference.

>> October 11th, San Jose, CA: The Science and Practice of Brain Fitness, at San Jose State University's Osher Lifelong Learning Institute. (Information here).

>> October 23rd, Pocatello, Idaho: Cognitive and Emotional Training for Healthy Aging, at the Idaho Conference on Health Care. (Information here).

>> November 1st, Berkeley, CA: The Science and Practice of Brain Fitness, at UC-Berkeley's Osher Lifelong Learning Institute. (Information here).

>> November 7-9th, Dubai: Global Agenda Councils Inaugural Summit in Dubai, organized by the World Economic Forum. (Information here).

>> November 17th, New York City: The Emerging Brain Fitness Field: Research and Implications, at New York Public Library.

>> December 5th, San Antonio, Texas: The Emerging Brain Fitness Field: Overview of Research and Tools, at the International Council on Active Aging conference. (Information here).

As always, I will share the main take-aways via this blog. I hope to meet some of you down the road!

There were a few interesting research papers presented at the last  American Psychological Association conventions around the theme:

Playing Video Games Offers Learning Across Life Span, Say Studies
-- Skills Transfer to Classroom, Surgical Procedures, Scientific Thinking (press release).

Probably the most interesting study was that of 303 laparoscopic surgeons, which "showed that surgeons who played video games requiring spatial skills and hand dexterity and then performed a drill testing these skills were significantly faster at their first attempt and across all 10 trials than the surgeons who did not the play video games first."

The note goes further to explain the implications from this research:

"The big picture is that there are several dimensions on which games have effects, including the amount they are played, the content of each game, what you have to pay attention to on the screen, and how you control the motions," said Gentile. "This means that games are not "good' or bad,' but are powerful educational tools and have many effects we might not have expected they could."

Very thoughtful quote. Please note a few elements about Continue Reading »

I apologize for the long delay in getting back to this column but I have a good excuse. We just recently had a baby, and boy, that takes care right there of the physical exercise need. Between carrying the baby upstairs and downstairs, running to get the baby, getting out of the bed and picking the baby up and putting the baby down a couple of times a night no you need not worry about getting your daily exercise dose in…Now, the majority of the answers to my post on the brain virtues of physical exercise suggests that most people think that the brain benefits of physical exercise are mostly to be understood as complementary effects of a healthy life style.

Is this correct? In my post today I will attempt to answer this question.

First, while generally healthier people seem to have healthier brains, the physical exercise effect on the brain seems to be independent of other things. One of the most important development in neuroscience was when the official dogma claiming that there was no neurogenesis (production of new brain cells) in the adult brain was toppled. Now we know that the brain is “plastic” meaning that, under the right circumstances, the brain can change Continue Reading »

Schools are beginning to offer an increasing number of courses in social and emotional intelligence, teaching students how to better understand their own emotions and the emotions of others.

It sounds warm and fuzzy, but it's a trend backed up by hard data. Today, new studies reveal that teaching kids to be emotionally and socially competent boosts their academic achievement. More precisely, when schools offer students programs in social and emotional learning, their achievement scores gain around 11 percentage points.

That's what I heard at a forum held last December by the Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning (CASEL). (Disclosure: I'm a co-founder of CASEL.) Roger Weissberg, the organization's director, gave a preview of a massive study run by researchers at Loyola University and the University of Illinois, which analyzed evaluations of more than 233,000 students across the country.

Social-emotional learning, they discovered, helps students Continue Reading »