Round-up of recent news with a variety of angles, from the effects of gaming to cognitive training for driving skills and brain fitness classes.

Seniors use brain training software to sharpen their minds (Dallas Morning News)

- “Allstate Insurance has invited some policyholders and other older drivers to try InSight so researchers can evaluate whether the software reduces accidents.”

- “Depending on the results, the auto insurer says it may expand the pilot project and offer premium discounts to drivers who take the brain training.”

- “Today, only one in seven licensed drivers is 65 or older. But by 2030, when the last of the boomers turn 65, the proportion will be one in four. “

Brain games (Palo Alto Weekly)

- “There is research that justifies the belief that games can aid the brain’s health, according to Dr. Walter Bortz II, a Stanford University School of Medicine associate professor and expert on longevity and robust aging. Studies show that stimulating the brain by learning new tasks increases blood factors in the brain that act like steroids, making it possible for the brain to grow even in old age

- “Called “brain plasticity,” such growth is the foundation of brain-fitness software research.”

Brain Fitness Classes Keep Seniors Mentally And Socially Active (Washington Post)

- “More options for exercising the brain are on the way. Last year, the Ontario government pledged about $8 million to develop a brain fitness center in Toronto. In San Francisco, Jan Zivic, a former executive search consultant, opened a center, vibrantBrains, that offers memory improvement classes and workshops. Zivic was inspired by help she got from brain fitness games she played after being injured in an automobile accident.”

The 15 Clearest Benefits of Gaming (Edge Magazine)

-”But Fernandez warns that the gamer generation isn’t automatically guaranteed to have better cognitive health than their grandparents. “Cognitive fitness (having the mental abilities required to thrive in cognitively more complex environments) seems to depend on four major pillars: nutrition, physical exercise, stress management and mental exercise. All these factors have physical effects on our brains (for example, physical exercise contributes to the creation of new neurons, while stress and anxiety prevents and/or reduces the creation of new neurons). The bad news is that we have growing obesity rates and anxiety among young people. So, games are great for mental exercise, but we shouldn’t forget the other ‘ingredients’ for cognitive fitness.”

- “Fernandez muses, “Indeed ‘fun’ can be seen as a goal in itself … The problem is that we confuse gaming as a vehicle with gaming as content. Gaming as vehicle is arguably great—it allows for interactivity, engagement. Gaming as content, well, it depends. It is not the same to play a bloody shooter game as it is to Tetris or Rise of Nations, so the field should do a better job at explaining to mainstream society the diversity of games and dispel some myths.”

More Brain Fitness and Cognitive Health News

Welcome to Encephalon´s 50th edition, where you will find another superb collection of blog posts on all things Brain and Mind.

Enjoy these contributions:

Science & Technology

Mind Hacks reports that Facebook ate my psychiatrist. We can learn about the benefits of social networking sites like Facebook, bringing great perspective to recent and misguided media speculation (fuelled by a recent talk at the Royal College of Psychiatrists). Vaughan, will you please report on the benefits of participating (and, better, hosting) Encephalon?.

Dungeons And Dragons – Or Mazes And Monsters?: PodBlack Cat offers a thought-provoking review of the therapy (including self-therapy) applications of role-playing games such as the classic Dungeons And Dragons and the more recent massively multiplayer online games.

Cognitive Daily covers another type of game. Read the rest of this entry »

Here you are have the bi-monthly Digest of our most Popular blog posts. (Also, remember that you can subscribe to receive our blog RSS feed, or to our newsletter at the top of this page if you want to receive this digest by email).

Brain Fitness News and Events

Upcoming Events: I will be speaking at five Health, Education and Gaming events over the next couple of months to introduce findings from our recent market report. Please introduce yourself if you attend any of these events.

Preventing Memory Loss-Special Issue: Congressional Quarterly Researcher, one of the main publications on Capitol Hill, published an impressive 24-page special issue titled Preventing Memory Loss. Highly recommended if you want to be on top of the latest research trends and their policy implications.

Read the rest of this entry »

This is an event you may be interested in, if you are based in the San Francisco Bay Area.

The MIT Club of Northern California, American Society on Aging, The Business Forum on Aging and SmartSilvers presents:

The Emerging Brain Fitness Market:  Building Better Brains (Contact information and Registration Here)

Date: 02/12/2008 Tuesday
Time: 6:00pm
Venue: Wilson Sonsini
Location: 950 Page Mill Road, Palo Alto
Cost: $20 online, $25 walk-in

Contact information and Registration Here.

Here is the buzz … Scientific, technological and demographic trends have converged to create an exciting new market in brain fitness, where software and online applications can assess and train cognitive abilities. That equates to a sharper mind and better memory retention contributing to healthier aging.  There is currently a $400m worldwide market with high growth ahead predicted.

Join us in lively and informative discussions as Alvaro Fernandez; CEO of SharpBrains.com summarizes the science, key market segments, players and trends, based on the first Brain Fitness Software Market Report, presented in this event.  He will discuss the implications with several neuro-technology, gaming experts and investors.”   Moderated by Zack Lynch, the speaker and panel will discuss:  Read the rest of this entry »

(Note: if you are trying to download the whitepaper featuring the 11 in-depth interviews that debunk those myths, click here).
Over the last year we have interviewed a number of leading brain health and fitness scientists and practitioners worldwide to learn about their research and thoughts, and have news to report.

What can we say today that we couldn’t have said only 10 years ago? That what neuroscience pioneer Santiago Ramon y Cajal claimed in the XX century, “Every man can, if he so desires, become the sculptor his own brain“, may well become reality in the XXI. And influence Education, Health, Training, and Gaming in the process.

We have only scratched the surface of what science-based structured cognitive (i.e., mental) exercise can do for brain health and productivity. We are now witnessing the birth of a new industry that crosses traditional sector boundaries and that may help us understand, assess and train our brains, harnessing the growing research about neurogenesis (the creation of new neurons), neuroplasticity (the ability of the brain to rewire itself through experience), cognitive training and emotional regulation.

Let’s now debunk 10 myths, still too prevalent, that may prevent us from seeing the full potential of this emerging field:

Myth 1: It’s all in our genes.

Reality: A big component of our lifelong brain health and development depends on what we do with our brains. Our own actions, not only our genes, influence our lives to a large extent. Genes predispose us, not determine our fates.

• “Individuals who lead mentally stimulating lives, through education, occupation and leisure activities, have reduced risk of developing Alzheimer’s. Studies suggest that they have 35-40% less risk of manifesting the disease” – Dr. Yaakov Stern, Division Leader of the Cognitive Neuroscience Division of the Sergievsky Center at Columbia University.

Myth 2: The field of Cognitive/ Brain Fitness is too new to be credible.

Reality: The field rests on solid foundations dating back more decades — what is new is the number and range of tools that are now starting to be available for healthy individuals.

• “Rigorous and targeted cognitive training has been used in clinical practice for many years. Exercising our brains systematically is as important as exercising our bodies.” – Dr. Elkhonon Goldberg, neuropsychologist, clinical professor of neurology at New York University School of Medicine, and disciple of Alexander Luria.

• “Today, thanks to fMRI and other neuroimaging techniques, we are starting to understand the impact our actions can have on specific parts of the brain.” – Dr. Judith Beck, Director of the Beck Institute for Cognitive Therapy and Research.

Myth 3: Medication is and will remain the only evidence-based intervention for a number of brain-related problems.

Reality: Cognitive training programs are starting to Read the rest of this entry »

Eliane writes a great post estimating the size of the Serious Games Market, building on the overall PriceWaterhouseCoopers report that seemed to indicate that the Global Video Game Market is Set to Explode.

Some quotes

• “The overall gaming audience continues to expand and become somewhat more female and older than in the past thanks to casual games and games becoming an “important part of culture” – which in my view would embed the Serious Games segment.”
• “Whereas the military was one of the first customers of Serious Games, it has been joined by a long line of users, including other government agencies, healthcare providers, schools (both K-12 and universities) and Fortune 500 companies (for team building, leadership training, sales training and product education, among others).”
• “This is my conservative estimate: the Serious Games market would be ranging between $200 – 400 million per year only in US, in 2007. “
• “There is now an emergent supply chain for Corporate Serious Games, with a number of corporations taking Read the rest of this entry »

One of the many Sharp Brains around, who is up to date of everything related to brain health and fitness (yes, Jeanne, that’s you! thanks for being such a great bureau chief!) has sent us a very interesting press note on how brain fitness and training can be applied in the sports performance world. I haven’t been able to track down the research behind the specific programs mentioned in the article, but the theoretical rationale makes sense based on similar programs we are familiar with: you can see below a summary of our interview with Prof. Daniel Gopher, scientific mind behind computer-based cognitive simulations for military pilots and for basketball players.

The note Sports Vision Training Takes Athletes to New Frontiers explains how

• “Specialty sports vision facilities are helping athletes train skills that many believed were “untrainable”; skills like anticipation, field vision, timing, sport intelligence, game tempo, reaction speed, focus and concentration.”
• “What has everyone all worked up is the knowledge that they can actually train athletic skills that many believed were “untrainable.” We’re talking about intangibles like anticipation, field vision, timing, sport intelligence, game tempo, reaction speed, focus and concentration. “One of the worst mistakes an athlete can make is to believe that you’re either born with or without these kinds of skills, and that they’re consequently not trainable,” says Brian Stammer, editor of SportsVision Magazine. “If you want to be the best athlete you can be, you must do exercises to condition and sharpen your sensory system, including visual, auditory and brain-processing speed.”
• This is the link to the magazine they mention: SportsVision Magazine

And here is the summary of my (AF) interview with Prof. Daniel Gopher (DG) on Cognitive Simulations and cognitive training:

• “AF: …Can you summarize your research findings across all these examples and fields, and how you see the field evolving?
• DG: In short, I’d summarize by saying that
• - Cognitive performance can be substantially improved with proper training. Read the rest of this entry »

We are a brain fitness center because we want to offer the best information, tools and support on how to exercise our brains. Same way you join the gym to stay in shape and find the best machines and personal trainers.

One of the “tools” or “machines” we offer was designed under the scientific supervision of Professor Daniel Gopher and his team for basketball players: click here to read our interview with him. And here for a fun clip with the Memphis Tigers.

Our partner ACE just issued this press release:

Fighter Pilots Help Purdue and Long Beach State Reach the Tournament

The Basketball IntelliGym™ Improves Decision-Making

STUDIO CITY, Calif.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–The same technology initially developed to train Israeli fighter pilots on the cognitive, brain level has been an integral part of the training regimen for both Long Beach State and Purdue, two teams earning their first NCAA tournament births since 1995 and 2003 respectively.

The innovative Basketball IntelliGym™ software program has been proven to improve real-time decision-making and execution for thousands of basketball players worldwide and players on more than a dozen college basketball teams. Read the rest of this entry »

Professor Bradley Gibson is an Associate Professor in the Department of Psychology at University of Notre Dame, and Director of the Perception and Attention Lab there. He is a cognitive psychologist with research interests in perception, attention, and visual cognition. Gibson’s research has been published in a variety of journals, including Journal of Experimental Psychology, Human Perception and Performance, Psychological Science, and Perception & Psychophysics.

In 2006 he conducted the first independent replication study based on the Cogmed Working Memory Training program we discussed with Dr. Torkel Klingberg.

A local newspaper introduced some preliminary results of the study Attention, please: Memory exercises reduce symptoms of ADHD. Some quotes from the articles:

- “The computer game has been shown to reduce ADHD symptoms in children in experiments conducted in Sweden, where it was developed, and more recently in a Granger school, where it was tested by psychologists from the University of Notre Dame.

- Fifteen students at Discovery Middle School tried RoboMemo during a five-week period in February and March, said lead researcher Brad Gibson

- As a result of that experience, symptoms of inattention and hyperactivity were both reduced, according to reports by teachers and parents, Gibson said.

- Other tests found significant improvement in “working memory”, a short-term memory function that’s considered key to focusing attention and controlling impulses.

- RoboMemo’s effectiveness is not as well established as medications, and it’s a lot more work than popping a pill.

- Gibson said Notre Dame’s study is considered preliminary because it involved a small number of students. Another limitation is that the study did not have a control group of students receiving a placebo treatment.”

We feel fortunate to interview Dr. Gibson today.

Alvaro Fernandez (AF): Dr. Gibson, thanks for being with us. Could you first tell us about your overall research interests?

Dr. Bradley Gibson (BG): Thanks for giving me this opportunity. My primary research Read the rest of this entry »