SharpBrains

Brain-fitness games join workplace, as well as senior center, arsenals (MarketWatch)

- "Consumers and retirement homes have made brain-fitness games and exercises a commercial hit, but now some insurers and employers are incorporating them into wellness programs that promote health not just for the body but also for the mind."

- "Improving brain health can result in less presenteeism, the tendency to be at work but be distracted and not able to focus," he added. "If you look at disability costs, absenteeism and presenteeism account for most of the medical costs, and that's a good reason for employers to be focused on brain health." (according to Dr. Eugene Baker, vice president at OptumHealth's Behavioral Solutions division)"

The article reviews innovative practices at OptumHealth, Nationwide Auto Insurance Company, Humana, Penn Treaty American Corp, Allstate, and the US Army. I am glad to see the media start to notice the importance of cognitive assessments and the growing activity by insurers. Continue Reading »

Ben Sawyer and I just agreed to create a new Cognitive Health track -Powered by SharpBrains- at the 5th Annual Games for Health Conference. I will host the 11-session track, covering a variety of cognitive health and brain fitness topics and an overview of SharpBrains' upcoming report The State of the Brain Fitness Software Market 2009.

When and where: June 11-12th at the Hyatt Harborside Hotel in Boston, MA.

Context: The Games for Health Conference is produced by The Serious Games Initiative and supported by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The conference brings together researchers, medical professionals, decision-makers at healthcare and insurance providers, innovators and game developers. I have attended a few times, and have always been impressed by the caliber of both speakers and everyone in the audience. Really a very good crowd.

Some options to participate?

1) Attend: The current price is $379, with a 15% discount if you use code "sharp09" (without quotation) when you register Here. Special price for students is $200.

Please note that the Cognitive Health track is being scheduled now - we will announce the detailed agenda during the month of May.

2) Speak: We are looking for innovators, researchers and decision-makers who would like to speak about their ongoing projects related to the use of games and other computer-based technologies for cognitive health.

If interested, please Contact Us, by May 1st, a couple of paragraphs summarizing a) your project, bio and organization, b) what key lessons learned and impressions you would share if given 20 minutes.

3) Advertise/ Sponsor/ Exhibit: To inquire about options, please contact Beth Bryant, one of the conference organizers, at bbryant at dmill.com

We are proud to collaborate with The Games for Health Conference and expand the Cognitive Health dialogue!

Learning can be incidental. We all memorize facts without paying much attention to these facts or without willing to memorize them. However, when one really wants to memorize a fact, it is crucial to pay attention. Many studies have shown that compared to full attention conditions, dividing attention during study time leads to poor memory performance.

This exercise will help you practice focusing your attention.

It may seem easy but make sure you count twice!

Count the number of “Y” in this text:

Yesterday, Lucy went all the way to Boston. She wanted to buy new shoes. She had to go in many shops before she found the shoes she wanted. She was happy to stop at a restaurant to have some tea and cookies before she took the train back home.

Count the number of “F” in this text:

Finished files are the result of years of scientific study combined with the experience of years.
Count the number of “E” in this text:

Last summer, Jean and Harriet spent their vacation in Michigan. They rented a cabin on the lake. The cabin had two bedrooms and a nice deck. They used to spend a lot of time on the deck, just looking at how the light would change on the water. Several times, they borrowed bikes from their neighbors and spent a few hours exploring the villages not far from their cabin.

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Solutions

There are 7 “Y” in the first text.

There are 6 "F" in the second text (got them?)
There are 38 “E” in the third text.

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For many other Brain Teasers, click Here.
For many other teasers and articles by Dr. Michelon, click Here.

-- Pascale Michelon, Ph. D., is SharpBrains' Research Manager for Educational Projects. Dr. Michelon has a Ph.D. in Cognitive Psychology and has worked as a Research Scientist at Washington University in Saint Louis, in the Psychology Department. She conducted several research projects to understand how the brain makes use of visual information and memorizes facts. She is now an Adjunct Faculty at Washington University.

Here you have the February edition of our monthly newsletter covering cognitive health and brain fitness topics. Please remember that you can subscribe to receive this Newsletter by email, simply by submitting your email at the top of this page.

Cognitive training (or structured mental exercise) definitely seems to work - as long as we define properly what "work" means, don't expect magic cures, and help navigate options. Please keep reading...

Interview: Baycrest

Interview with Baycrest's CEO Dr. William Reichman: Discussing the recent Centre for Brain Fitness at Baycrest, Dr. Reichman suggests that "we have an opportunity to make major progress in Brain Health in the XXI century, similar to what happened with Cardiovascular Health in the XXth, and technology will play a crucial role." A major obstacle? We need a consensus on "widely accepted standards for outcome measures".

Does It Work?

Does cognitive training work? (For Whom? For What?): The growing field of cognitive training (one of the tools for brain fitness) can appear very confusing as the media keeps reporting contradictory claims. These claims are often based on press releases, without a deeper understanding of the scientific evidence. Dr. Pascale Michelon, SharpBrains' Research Manager for Educational Initiatives, analyzes a couple of recent studies, clarifying what they mean - and what they don't mean.

It Works, and It Doesn't Work: the IMPACT study (a major, multi-site study on the Posit Science auditory program) will be published at the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society in April. Results support that cognitive training works - but doesn't support the grandiose "brain age" claims we see too often.

Cognitive Training can Influence Brain Biochemistry: Dr. David Rabiner discusses a recent scientific study that "shows that brain biochemistry can be modified by experience", and that computerized cognitive training (Cogmed working memory training) can provide that experience.

The Big Picture

Making Healthy Choices - Primare Care and Prevention: a panel at the recent World Economic Forum explored why "New markets and industries are arising – “silver industries” such as financial services, health, housing and hospitality geared to senior citizens. Longevity needs to be linked to health – including cognitive health – and lifestyle choices play a major role in health."

Enrich your environment now and benefit your future offspring: Dr. Robert Sylwester reports that "all sorts of long held-beliefs about our brain and cognition are being re- examined by cognitive neuroscientists" because of fascinating studies such as the one  he reviews (with mice): "The study's findings seemed to suggest that acquired characteristics can be genetically transmitted...long-term benefits accrue from a stimulating early environment that encourages curiosity and exploration."

Managing Emotions

From Distress to De-Stress: helping anxious, worried kids: In a detailed 2-part article, (Part 1, Part 2), Dr. Jerome Schultz provides great tips on how to help children learn to self-regulate emotions, adding that "Teachers, occupational therapists, physical education teachers and parents need to actually teach children (of all ages) how to get themselves into a physical state of being relaxed. This doesn’t happen automatically. If it did, there wouldn’t be so many adult yoga classes!"

Lie to Me, Paul Ekman and Biofeedback: You may have watched the new series Lie To Me, with Tim Roth, based on the work of Paul Ekman. The introduction to the second episode shows why what are called "lie detectors" are nothing but biofeedback systems that measure physiological anxiety.

News

Brain Games for Baby Boomers: round-up of other recent news, covering the effects of gaming, cognitive training for driving skills, and brain fitness classes.

Neurocognitive assessments and sports concussions: a new study and a new resource to understand and address the 1.6 to 3.8 million cases of sports-related concussions that occur annually in the United States.

Brain Teaser

How will you, your organization, your neighbors, participate in Brain Awareness Week, March 16th-22nd, organized by the Dana Foundation with the participation of thousands of outreach partners, including SharpBrains? You can find event ideas, excellent resources (yes, including puzzles), and a calendar of events, Here.

Have a great month of March!

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

As you may know, memory relies mostly on some temporal (in green) and frontal (in red) areas of the brain. These may be the areas that will get stimulated when you (assuming you are American or have lived in the US for long) try to remember the missing words in the American proverbs below.

However when it comes to internationals proverbs below you may have to use your reasoning skills more than your memory skills, as it is likely that you do not know these proverbs. In this case, the frontal exercise is more intense. Try to guess what the final words of each international proverb might be. Use your logical skills.

If you live outside the USA, your experience will probably be the reverse.

US proverbs

1. The early bird gets the ___________.
2. After all is _______ and done, more is said than __________.
3. From ___________ beginnings come great ____________. Continue Reading »

NeuroActive Bike: America’s First and Only Mind-Body Fitness Equipment Launched at Lady of America Fitness Centers (press release)

- "The patent-pending bike, engineered by Dr. Bergeron and BCA (Brain Center America)’s international team of brain specialists, makes its U.S. debut this month at Lady of America (LOA) fitness centers."

- "Users of the NeuroActive Bike may select from 22 brain-stimulating exercises that train different parts of the brain, including: memory of names and faces, 3D visuo-spatial skills, concentration, word naming and arithmetic. As they pedal, they manipulate a wireless mouse to interact with the computer and complete the NeuroActive Program"

In our 2008 market report we offered Top 10 Brain Training Future Trends, including:

"2. Physical and mental exercise will be better integrated. Physical exercise has been shown to increase the rate of neurogenesis, whereas mental exercise helps ensure the survival of any newly created neurons. Today both activities usually take place in very different settings: the former, in health clubs, the later, in universities. We predict that the borders between them will become more diffuse. Expect new programs such as brain fitness podcasts that allow us to train working memory as we jog or exercise bikes with built-in brain games."

Here you have SharpBrains' 30 most popular articles, ranked by the number of people who have read each article in 2008.

Please note that, since the first article already includes most of our most popular brain teasers, we have excluded teasers from the rest of the ranking. (If those 50 are not enough for you, you can also try these brain teasers).

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Continue Reading »

Here you have the November edition of our monthly newsletter covering cognitive health and brain fitness topics. Please remember that you can subscribe to receive this Newsletter by email, simply by submitting your email at the top of this page.

Thank you for your interest, attention and participation in our SharpBrains community. As always, we appreciate your comments and suggestions.

Summit of the Global Agenda

How can we persuade business leaders, policy-makers and researchers of the urgency to develop and promote an integrated "Healthy Living" agenda focused on maintaining lifelong physical and cognitive health, vs. the usual mindset focused on dealing with specific diseases and problems once they arise?

In The Future of the Aging Society: Burden or Human Capital?, I summarize some of the key themes discussed at the World Economic Forum event in Dubai on November 7-9th. The world is aging - and in healthier ways. But our healthcare and retirement systems are on track to go bankrupt - their premises are outdated. The current disease-based research agenda compounds the problem. Solutions? 1) Promote Healthy Lifestyles that help Maintain Physical and Cognitive Functional Abilities, 2) Redesign Environments to Foster Health, Engagement and Financial Security, 3) Develop an Integrated Healthy Living & Aging Research Agenda. Specifically, we could work with the UN and Global 2000 companies to move forward a new agenda.

Planet Earth 2.0: A New Operating System: Imagine seeing a top sheik in Dubai, wrapped in traditional Arab clothing, exclaim “Yes We Can” (a la Obama) in front of the 800 global experts, adding that “we build the future with our own hands”. Some of the attendants of the World Economic Forum's Summit of the Global Agenda urged us to “reboot” the system. More than a "reboot", we may have to upgrade to a new global "Yes We Can" operating system.

Brain Fitness Research

Neuroplasticity and the Brain That Changes Itself: Laurie Bartels reviews the excellent book by Norman Doidge, explaining that "the neuroscience behind Doidge’s book involves neuroplasticity, which is the brain’s ability to rewire itself. This means that the brain – our intelligence – is not something fixed in concrete but rather a changing, learning entity."

Can We Pick Your Brain re: Cognitive Assessments?: In our view, a critical component in the maturity of the brain fitness market will be the availability of inexpensive, valid and reliable objective cognitive assessments,  to help measure how our brain functions change over time and identify priorities for targeted improvements. Dr. Joshua Steinerman asks if you would be up for them?

Use It (Properly) or Lose It

Physical and mental exercise to prevent cognitive decline: The American Medical News, a weekly newspaper for physicians published by the American Medical Association, just published an excellent article on the importance of physical and mental exercise. We are very happy to see efforts like these to train physicians and health professionals in general,  given that most of them were trained under a very different understanding of the brain than the one we have today.

Brain Fitness 2: Sight & Sound: PBS recently announced the second installment of their popular Brain Fitness Program show, to start airing soon.

MetaCarnival #1: a conversation across the blogosphere: We often insist on "Novelty, Variety and Challenge" as key ingredients for good "brain exercise". There are many ways to mix those ingredients - you may enjoy this one, the first interdisciplinary gathering of blogs and blog carnivals covering health, science, anthropology, general advice and more.

Top 15 Brain Teasers and Games for Mental Exercise: Over the last 2 years we have published close to 100 puzzles, teasers, riddles, and every kind of mental exercise (without counting our in-depth interviews with top neuroscientists). Which ones have proven most stimulating for you. Let us know. Here is a selection of our Top 15 teasers.

Final Details

Please share this newsletter with your friends and colleagues if you haven't done so already.

Have a Happy Thanksgiving!

You may have already seen that our Teasers section contains not only our selection of Top 50 Brain Teasers and Games, but also a regularly updated page with latest Games for the Brain.

Below you have the brain games and teasers we have added in 2008 so far. Ready?
- October 2008: Top Brainy Haikus. Yours?.

- September 2008: What is going on with these pictures?.

- September 2008: 7 Brainteasers for Job Interviews.

- August 2008: Can you use mental self rotation to read a map?.

- August 2008: Spot the Differences! how many are there?.

- July 2008 Continue Reading »