The Executive Brain and How our Minds Can Grow Stronger

September 8, 2006 at 7:26 pm · Filed under Books, Brain exercises, Brain health, Leadership, Learning, Lifelong learning, Mental Health, Neurogenesis, Neurons, Pattern Recognition, Physical Fitness, Serious Games

Last week I had the pleasure to meet, in his NYC clinical practice, with our scientific advisor Dr. Elkhonon Goldberg, renowned neuropsychologist and author of The Executive Brain: Frontal Lobes and the Civilized Mind and The Wisdom Paradox: How Your Mind Can Grow Stronger As Your Brain Grows Older

Which brings me back to the beginning of our Brain Fitness adventure, once it became obvious that the world of Brain Fitness was real and coming. Let me try to summarize some of the key overall research findings outlined in both books:

–   Our brains enjoy Lifelong Brain Plasticity: until recently, a popular misconception was that  neurons die through life and do not get replenished. Now, neurogenesis, or the ability of our brains to create new neurons until the very day we die, is proven.

–   Intense mental challenges provide extra resistance to ageing and improve pattern recognition and brain “efficiency”, this is, the ability to take on similar challenges with reduced metabolical demands

–   Our mental activity influences the generation of neurons and where they go. The functional capacity of our neural networks depends on the number of neurons and their connections-both short and long

–   Exercising our brains is as important as exercising our bodies. “Use it or lose it” came from athletics to brain science. Even better, now we know that “Use it and get more of it.

–   The pathways that connect the frontal lobes with the rest of the brain are slow to mature, reaching full operational state, and therefore social maturity, between the ages of 18 and 30.

–   Intensive and well-targeted Brain Fitness Programs can produce good results in as short as 3 months. 

–   The rate of development of new neurons can be influenced by cognitive activities. Another day we will cover more ground on the specific research studies that discovered the findings above, and on Dr. Goldberg’s work on Brain Fitness programs.In the meantime, you can read some fascinating articles categorized by topic at our Resources section.

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