The Harvard Business Review just published (thanks Catherine!) this article on cognitive fitness, by Roderick Gilkey and Clint Kilts. We are happy to see the growing interest on how to maintain healthy and productive brains, from a broadening number of quarters. Without having yet fully read the article…it seems to provide a reasonable introduction to brain science, yet could have more beef regarding assessment, training and recommendations. In such an emerging field, though, going one step at a time makes sense. What really matters is thet fact itself that it was published.

Today we interview Dr. Arthur Lavin, Associate Clinical Professor of Pediatrics at Case Western School of Medicine, pediatrician in private practice, and one of the first providers of Cogmed Working Memory Training in the US (the program whose research we discussed with Dr. Torkel Klingberg and Dr. Bradley Gibson). Dr. Lavin has a long standing interest in technology-as evidenced by Microsoft’s recognition of his paperless office- and in brain research and applications-he trained with esteemed Mel Levine from All Kinds of Minds-.

————————–

Key take-aways:

- Schools today are not yet in a position to effectively help kids with cognitive issues deal with increasing cognitive demands.

- Working Memory is a cognitive skill fundamental to planning, sequencing, and executing school-related work.

- Working Memory can be trained, as evidenced by Dr. Lavin’s work, based on Cogmed Working Memory Training, with kids who have attention deficits.

————————–

Context on cognitive fitness and schools

AF (Alvaro Fernandez): Dr. Lavin, thanks for being with us. It is not very common for a pediatrician to have such an active interest in brain research and cognitive fitness. Can you explain the source of your interest?

AL (Arthur Lavin): Throughout my life I have been fascinated by how the mind works. Both from the research point of view and the practical one: how can scientists’ increasing knowledge improve kids’ lives? We now live in an truly exciting era in which solid scientific progress in neuroscience is at last creating opportunities to improve people’s actual cognitive function. The progress Cogmed has achieved in creating a program that can make great differences in the lives of children with attention deficits is one of the most exciting recent developments. My colleague Ms. Susan Glaser and I recently published two books: Who’s Boss: Moving Families from Conflict to Collaboration (Collaboration Press, 2006) and Baby & Toddler Sleep Solutions for Dummies (Wiley, 2007), so I not only see myself as a pediatrician but also an educator. I see parents in real need of guidance and support. They usually are both very skeptical, since Read the rest of this entry »

Tom alerts us (thanks!) of a fun book review in the New York Times today, by Abigail Zuger, titled The Brain: Malleable, Capable, Vulnerable, on the book The Brain That Changes Itself (Viking, $24.95) by psychiatrist Norman Doidge. Some quotes:

• “In bookstores, the science aisle generally lies well away from the self-help section, with hard reality on one set of shelves and wishful thinking on the other. But Norman Doidge’s fascinating synopsis of the current revolution in neuroscience straddles this gap: the age-old distinction between the brain and the mind is crumbling fast as the power of positive thinking finally gains scientific credibility.”
• “So it is forgivable that Dr. Doidge, a Canadian psychiatrist and award-winning science writer, recounts the accomplishments of the “neuroplasticians,” as he calls the neuroscientists involved in these new studies, with breathless reverence. Their work is indeed mind-bending, miracle-making, reality-busting stuff, with implications, as Dr. Doidge notes, not only for individual patients with neurologic disease but for all human beings, not to mention human culture, human learning and human history.”
• “Research into the malleability of the normal brain has been no less amazing. Subjects who learn to play a sequence of notes on the piano develop characteristic changes in the brain’s electric activity; when other subjects sit in front of a piano and just think about playing the same notes, the same changes occur. It is the virtual made real, a solid quantification of the power of thought.”
• “The new science of the brain may still be in its infancy, but already, as Dr. Doidge makes quite clear, the scientific minds are leaping ahead.”

Here you have some of our interviews with a few “scientific minds” that have, for years, been “leaping ahead” beyond “positive thinking” into “positive training”:

• Dr. Elkhonon Goldberg on Brain Fitness Programs and Cognitive Training. Dr. Goldberg is a neuropsychologist and clinical professor of neurology at New York University School of Medicine. He was a student and close associate of the great neuropsychologist Alexander Luria, and has written The Executive Brain and The Wisdom Paradox.
• On Cognitive Simulations for Basketball Game-Intelligence: Interview with Prof. Daniel Gopher. Dr. Gopher is Professor of Cognitive Psychology and Human Factors Engineering at Technion, Israel’s Institute of Science, and scientific advisor for IntelliGym.
• Memory training and attention deficits: interview with Professor Bradley Gibson, Associate Professor in the Department of Psychology at University of Notre Dame, and Director of the Perception and Attention Lab there
• On Working Memory Training and RoboMemo: Interview with Dr. Torkel Klingberg, professor at Karolinska Institute, and director of the Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience Lab, part of the Stockholm Brain Institute. He is also the scientific advisor for Cogmed Working Memory Training program (RoboMemo).
• An ape can do this. Can we not? with Dr. James Zull, Professor of Biology and Biochemistry at Case Western University, and author of The Art of Changing the Brain.

And a couple of related blog posts:

• Can Thoughts and Action Change Our Brains?
• Books on neuroplasticity and memory training

Notre Dame Professor Bradley Gibson, whom we interviewed a few months ago (see below) presented the results from his study recently at the Society for Research in Child Development (SRCD):

University of Notre Dame Professor and Research Team are First in U.S. to Validate Breakthrough Study on  the Effectiveness of Working Memory Training in Improving Attention Deficits in Children (pdf)

• “Dr. Bradley Gibson, associate professor of psychology at the University of Notre Dame, and his colleagues (Gibson, Seroczynski, Gondoli, Braungart-Rieker, & Grundy, 2007)  will share new findings from the first U.S. study on the effectiveness of Cogmed Working Memory Training for improving attention abilities in children with ADHD. The study validates previous research from Sweden’s Karolinska Institute which revealed a fundamental breakthrough in the way attention problems are proactively treated. Gibson will unveil the results of the U.S. study during the Society for Research in Child Development (SRCD) bi-annual conference in Boston. Cogmed is a pioneer in neurotechnology and a developer of software-based working memory training products.”

Our interview with Notre Dame’s Bradley Gibson

• AF: Tell us about ADD/ ADHD and development trajectories.
• BG: There is a very insightful study by Walter Mischel on pre-schoolers aged 4 and 5. Some of them had a Read the rest of this entry »

We hope you are enjoying Brain Awareness Week this week and hopefully thinking a little more about your brain and brain fitness! Below you have the Brain Fitness Newsletter we sent a few days ago. You can subscribe to this monthly email update in the box on the the top of this page.

We have had another busy month behind us, and we’re looking forward to Brain Awareness Week March 12-18. Keep reading for the details (including a special offer in honor of Brain Awareness Week) …

I. Press Coverage
II. Events
III. Program Reviews
IV. New Offerings
V. Website and Blog Summary, including brain teasers
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 »