SharpBrains

Charles Darwin (1809-1882)'s autobiography (full text free online) includes some very insightful refections on the evolution of his own mind during his middle-age, showcasing the power of the brain to rewire itself through experience (neuroplasticity) during our whole lifetimes-not just when we are youngest.

He wrote these paragraphs at the age of 72 (I have bolded some key sentences for emphasis, the whole text makes great reading):

"I have said that in one respect my mind has changed during the last twenty or thirty years. Up to the age of thirty, or beyond it, poetry of many kinds, such as the works of Milton, Gray, Byron, Wordsworth, Coleridge, and Shelley, gave me great pleasure, and even as a schoolboy I took intense delight in Shakespeare, especially in the historical plays. I have also said that formerly pictures gave me considerable, and music very great delight. But now for many years I cannot endure to read a line of poetry: I have tried lately to read Shakespeare, and found it so intolerably dull that it nauseated me. I have also almost lost my taste for pictures or music. Music generally sets me thinking too energetically on what I have been at work on, instead of giving me pleasure. I retain some taste for fine scenery, but it does not cause me the exquisite delight which it formerly did. On the other hand, novels which are works of the imagination, though not of a very high order, have been for years a wonderful relief and pleasure to me, and I often bless all novelists. A surprising number have been read aloud to me, and I like all if moderately good, and if they do not end unhappily-- against which a law ought to be passed. A novel, according to my taste, does not come into the first class unless it contains some person whom one can thoroughly love, and if a pretty woman all the better.

This curious and lamentable loss of the higher aesthetic tastes is all the odder, as books on history, biographies, and travels (independently of any scientific facts which they may contain), and essays on all sorts of subjects interest me as much as ever they did. My mind seems to have become a kind of machine for grinding general laws out of large collections of facts, but why this should have caused the atrophy of that part of the brain alone, on which the higher tastes depend, I cannot conceive. A man with Continue Reading »

Very fun article in the Birmingham News today on SharpBrains and brain exercises, titled Want a workout for your brain?.

The journalist explains things very well and with great humor (for the humor, you need to read the article!). Here are some quotes:

- "Think of it as a gymnasium for your mind," SharpBrains CEO and co-founder Alvaro Fernandez says from his office in San Francisco.

- (On only doing crosswords) "That's good, but, like your body, you don't just exercise one part of the brain," says Fernandez, who holds an MBA and a master's degree in education from Stanford University. "You need constant variety, and new things, to keep your brain working hard."

- "He sees mental gymnastics as the next mainstream adult trend and points out that therapists have long used a variety of similar exercises to help in the recovery of brain-injury patients. Athletes and airplane pilots have had access to exercises designed to improve their peripheral vision and reaction times, Fernandez says."

- "With SharpBrains co-founder Dr. Elkhonon Goldberg, a clinical professor of neurology at the New York University School of Medicine, Fernandez has collected what he says are the best computer-based brain workouts available, including a program to help children with attention deficits and another aimed at reducing stress management among business executives."

The Wall Street Journal has a great article today, Putting Brain Exercises to the Test (requires subscription), that compares 6 different computer-based brain exercise programs along ease-of-use, fun, and science behind. We at SharpBrains conducted a very similar exercise last year, coming to basically the same conclusions.

The article compares Nintendo Brain Age, MyBrainBuilder, MyBrainTrainer, HappyNeuron, (CogniFit Science) MindFit and Posit Science brain fitness 2.0, and ends up recommending Continue Reading »

See our second press release below, and visit our Press Room for the great press we are starting to get about our brain fitness gym.

Special Offer: For a limited time, you can receive a complimentary copy of our Brain Fitness 101 e-Guide: Answers to your Top 25 Questions, written by Dr. Elkhonon Goldberg and Alvaro Fernandez, by subscribing to our monthly newsletter. You can subscribe Here.

SharpBrains introduces First Online Brain Fitness Center

– Unique, Full-Service, Science-Based Fitness Center Ushers in the Next Workout Revolution: Mental Exercise –

SAN FRANCISCO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Thirty years after the emergence of the exercise boom, the fitness revolution has finally gone to people's heads: SharpBrains.com has launched the first online brain fitness center. Complete with a variety of science-based mental exercise equipment, personal brain trainers, and nearly 200 articles, interactive blog postings and interviews with industry experts, SharpBrains is spearheading the evolution of the fitness industry to include a sound mind as well as a healthy body.

The new mental exercise movement is founded on using structured, computer-based brain fitness routines tailored to each member's specific needs and level of ability. Just as crunches and kick-boxing tone abs and increase cardio strength, Continue Reading »

...a few questions: how did you find us, what we are doing well, what we can do better?

We have just found out that more than 600 people are receiving our feeds, but we only know-and just a bit- the 50-60 who leave comments and link to us. We enjoy having so many readers not just in the US but in Europe, the Middle East, Asia, Australia...(thanks Google Analytics!).

Would you mind writing a comment to allow us to learn about you and your interests, and also include your feedback for us? If you have a blog, please write the URL so we can pay a visit.

Enjoy the weekend, and thanks a lot for your time and attention!

Caroline and Alvaro

We are spending more time talking to journalists these days. A frequent question we receive is, "OK, which computer-based programs do you consider to be Brain Fitness Programs, not just "games" for pure fun"?.

Our answer: the rate of development of new programs by neuroscientists worldwide is really increasing, and there are already a few out there that combine good underlying science with embedded quality assessments and user-friendly guidelines and exercises from a fitness and prevention (vs. medical "prescription") perspective. Some of these are:

Cogmed Working Memory Training program (RoboMemo), helps children with attention deficits to overcome the working memory gap. and is distributed exclusively through selected clinical providers.

Freeze-Framer is a biometric-based system that helps people of all ages and occupations (from students to nurses and traders) get into The Zone of optimal learning and performance by managing the negative effects of stress and anxiety. Our partner is the Institute of HeartMath.

IntelliGym  provides a mental workout to improve core basketball abilities, such as coordination, attention control, peripheral vision, and perception.  Yes, this can be trained. It is basketball specific, so we don't recommend it for other sports. Our partner is ACE.

MindFit helps train 14 different cognitive functions that are important for healthy aging. Even if the activities are helpful for people of all ages (I personally use it as my "brain gym" during flights, being in my mid-30s), the look & feel is more appropriate for people over 50, so we recommend it mainly for that group. Our partner is Vigorous Mind.

Posit Science offers an intensive program for training core auditory processing abilities. Auditory processing is one of the areas that typically decline with age, so this would be a great starting point for anyone, usually above 60 given the marketing we see in their website, who may be experiencing problems with his/ her hearing and understanding capabilities. We do not offer this program through our website, but certainly respect their scientists and research.

We are constantly looking for new ones, so keep tuned.

Getting ready for the holidays, not the best time to write great original content...so let us share the only review we have found so far on one of the programs we offer, MindFit.

First, a good article titled The dawn of cognitive technology, on the science behind the need for structured computer-based programs, with quotes such as Continue Reading »

We are very excited to announce our newly released Brain Fitness for Sharp Brains: Your New New Year Resolution. We wrote it in order to provide an introduction to the concept, science, and practice of brain fitness in plain English, by answering the Top 25 questions we have received over the last four months. Dr. Elkhonon Goldberg, Alvaro Fernandez and myself (Caroline) have been working hard on this.

You can click here to get your copy of the complete guide. Otherwise, keep checking back this blog, as we will publish a new question and its answer every Monday and Thursday before 9AM Pacific Standard Time. If we missed your pressing question, let us know!

Here is a sneak preview of the questions we will be answering ...

Continue Reading »