Keep Fit Program For The Brain

merryprankster writes "New Scientist is running a feature on 11 steps to a better brain. While becoming a nun might be an extreme way to avoid senility, there are lots of other tricks, techniques and habits, as well as changes to your lifestyle, diet and behaviour that can help you flex your grey matter and get the best out of your brain cells." From the article: "First, go to the top of the class by eating breakfast. The brain is best fuelled by a steady supply of glucose, and many studies have shown that skipping breakfast reduces people's performance at school and at work. But it isn't simply a matter of getting some calories down. According to research published in 2003, kids breakfasting on fizzy drinks and sugary snacks performed at the level of an average 70-year-old in tests of memory and attention."

Go

[professorhojo (686761)]

i recommend a game of "Go" a day

"It's official: playing go really does keep your mind sharp. Researchers have just released a comprehensive study [nejm.org] of the benefits of challenging intellectual activity among the elderly and found that exercising the mind through board games, social activities and education offers powerful protection against mental deterioration and disease.

'Those who played board games had a 74 percent lower risk and those who played an instrument had a 69 percent lower risk. Doing crossword puzzles cut the risk by 38 percent,' reported Shankar Vedantam in the June 19 Washington Post. The report found that seniors who regularly engaged in mentally challenging pastimes reduced their chances of developing Alzheimer's disease and other dementias by as much as 75 percent, compared with those who didn't exercise their minds."

More info on Go [wikipedia.org], the game that exercises both sides of your brain!

correnlation and causation.

[Vellmont (569020)]

I see nothing in your quote or the tiny amount of text in the linked article that indicates this is nothing more than a correlation study. Did they actually take a random group of senior and somehow get half of them to play board games, and the other half to not play board games and then come back years later and see if there was and difference between the two? (How the hell you'd get the people to either play, or not play board games despite their preference I have no idea).

If not, it seems far more likely that people that have dementia don't want to play board games, instruments, etc because.. well they have dementia. That might make it a LOT harder to concentrate on something like a board game or an instrument.

Re:correnlation and causation.

[porcupine8 (816071)]

If not, it seems far more likely that people that have dementia don't want to play board games, instruments, etc because.. well they have dementia. That might make it a LOT harder to concentrate on something like a board game or an instrument.

Or, even more likely, that the mental characteristics that lead one to enjoy mentally stimulating activities like crosswords and board games are also ones that are associated with a lower risk of dementia.

Re:Vs. Chess?

[v01d (122215)]

No offense, but I'm guessing you're not very good at chess. From what I've read about grand masters, and from my personal experience, the good chess players very much base their play on board patterns and abstractions. People simply can't analyze more than a few moves in advance, at least at a reasonable speed.

The timing couldn't be better

[coupland (160334)]

I suspect the folks at Netscape [slashdot.org] could really benefit from this. (See preceding article...)

11-step program?

[TFGeditor (737839)]

What happened to the 12th step?

Oh, wait...

12th step...

[by Anonymous Coward]

...Profit!

Re:11-step program?

[WormholeFiend (674934)]

The 12th step was stamped top secret by the government authorities who don't want people to know to protect their brains from mind control satellites with the help of tinfoil hats.

D'oh

[shreevatsa (845645)]

The obvious stuff that has been known for millenia -- eat healthy, exercise (your body and your brain), don't abuse yourself.
Sad that this is so forgotten that it is news.

Re:D'oh

[meeotch (524339)]

C'mon - didn't you RTFA? Eat healthy, exercise (your body and your brain), don't abuse yourself, and MASSIVE, MASSIVE DOSES OF MODAFINIL & RITALIN - at least 2,000mg a day.

Friggin' spinach and crossword puzzles aren't going to help you figure out which satellites Major League Baseball is using to spy on you, hippie.

mitch

ouch...

[coop0030 (263345)]

kids breakfasting on fizzy drinks and sugary snacks performed at the level of an average 70-year-old in tests of memory and attention.

Wow, so that makes me about 90, every day.

Maybe that's why I couldn't remember my girlfriends birthday. This will be my excuse from now on!

"Hun, I don't eat a healthy breakfast, how am I possibly going to remember to do the laundry?!"

Good Habits

[lukewarmfusion (726141)]

"While becoming a nun might be an extreme way to avoid senility, there are lots of other tricks, techniques and habits..."

There are non-nun habits?

Sugary snacks

[ignorant_coward (883188)]

Well intentioned parents buy their kids crap like Pop Tarts or NutriGrain bars thinking they are healthy. Well read the ingredients and the nutrition label. Practically no fiber, and corn syrup and hydrogenated fat dominate.

Most of the breakfast convenience foods are just candy packaged differently. It's better to eat a piece of fruit (low glycemic index) or whole wheat toast, which, suprise suprise, are just as convenient!

Re:Sugary snacks

[Spy der Mann (805235)]

Practically no fiber, and corn syrup and hydrogenated fat dominate.

I wouldn't be so sure about it. Right here I have a box of Kellogg's NutriGrain.

Ingredients:
whole wheat, sugars, vegetal fat (doesn't say partially hydrogenated), egg, calcium carbonate, iodated salt, sodium bicarbonate, color, (lots of vitamins go on in here); for the strawberry filling: corn syrup, sugar,maltodextrine,dextrose,strawberries (emphasis mine), water, glicerine, powdered apple, pectine, artificial and natural flavors, sodium

Re:Sugary snacks

[srleffler (721400)]

Note that, by law, the ingredients are listed by quantity, from most to least. (I'm not sure if it's by weight or by volume.) This means that the filling is primarily corn syrup and sugars. There is less strawberry in that filling than each of the three kinds of sugar listed, and less of each of those than corn syrup. Note that while artificial and natural flavors and red dye #40 are way down the list, it doesn't take much of these to give the red color and the nice strawberry flavor. Altogether, the filling is best characterized as synthetically-flavored sugar syrup. They add a tiny amount of strawberry and apple so that they can claim on the packaging that it contains real fruit, without increasing the cost too much.

If you still have it handy, check out the nutrition information box on the package. Does one serving contain a measurable amount of fiber? I have run into products made with 'whole wheat' that somehow managed not to have even a gram of fiber in them. I'm not sure how they manage that.

Nutrigrain bars are basically vitamin-enriched cookies. They are probably better for you than a regular cookie, or a donut, but they don't really qualify as healthy food either.

Re:Sugary snacks

[pg110404 (836120)]

Perhaps the problem is as much what people eat as how much time they are willing to invest in eating it.

Something like a pop tart or nutrigrain bar is it's ready right away.

Sugar is a simple carbohydrate and is readily absorbed into the bloodstream. There's a nasty spike of sugar in the blood and the body produces a whole lot of insulin to get rid of it by converting it into fat. Whole wheat toast is an example of a complex carbohydrate which has long chains of carbohydrates. The body has to expend a fair bit of energy just to break it down so it ends up taking far longer to work into the bloodstream.

While there are convenient foods like toast or fruit that provide the complex carbohydrates, leftover spaghetti or rice from the night before would also do the trick and would give you the staying power that a piece of fruit might not give.

The body also starts to slow its metabolic rate down several hours before you go to bed and in north america, we (foolishly) eat our biggest meal then. From a weight loss point of view it makes the most sense to eat a modest meal when we get up to kickstart the metabolism, to eat the largest meal at noon so we have the energy to do all our work throughout the day, and a light snack at 6pm to tide us over through the night (for /. regulars that would be noon for breakfast, 4:0pm for lunch and 10:00 pm for the evening snack before bed).

Re:Sugary snacks

[srleffler (721400)]

One qualification to this otherwise good post: more recent research shows that the distinction between simple and complex carbohydrates is less clear-cut than was previously thought. Some foods containing complex carbohydrates have a much more rapid impact on blood sugar than others. Things that make the food harder to digest (like fiber) tend to slow down the digestion and reduce the sugar surge. The impact of foods on blood sugar is characterized by glycemic index and glycemic load [mendosa.com], which have been measured for a wide variety of foods in several research studies. Generally white bread, pasta, and rice cause a much stronger sugar surge in the bloodstream than wholegrain bread, brown rice, etc. Fruit may not be as bad as you think, because the high fiber content slows down the sugar surge. An apple has a glycemic load of 4, vs. 10 for a piece of white bread, 8 for whole wheat bread, or 17 for a doughnut. (20 on this scale is very high.) Note that many websites use glycemic index rather than glycemic load. The link I give above explains the difference.

The real impact of this on diet and weight is less clear. Some have taken this new research as compelling evidence that carbohydrates are bad and should be avoided. Other nutritionists are skeptical of this position. The truth probably lies somewhere in between--North Americans probably eat too many carbohydrates, and too many of the ones we eat are of the kind that is rapidly processed into blood sugar (e.g. white bread instead of whole wheat).

Re:Sugary snacks

[pg110404 (836120)]

Thanks for clearing up that absorption thing. I'd heard a few years back that while rice, potatoes, etc were loaded with starch, it still took a fair bit of time for the enzymes to break them down to their simpler sugar forms, or simple enough to be absorbed through the intestinal wall. It would be akin to making gravel size pebbles fit through a grate from fist sized rocks v.s. car sized boulders using a large workforce swinging pick axes. There are only so many people that can surround a car sized boulder

I recommend a workout a day

[50000BTU_barbecue (588132)]

Preferably in the morning before breakfast. Yes, it's quite a challenge the first few times you do it, but wouldn't you rather be outside and biking than watching the same old dreary news in the morning?

It requires a bit of self-control as you have to ignore your hunger but as your body gets used to the idea that it will eat later anyways, you won't notice it much.

This energizes me quite a lot, and the work day just goes by faster, and problems are much easier to tackle.

AFTER BREAKFAST!!!

[Penguinoflight (517245)]

Your understanding of exercise is wrong. If you must eat breakfast alone to do a workout in the morning, eat breakfast alone. Completing a workout after eating 7-10 hours earlier is not healthy, and will mostly break down muscle. If you want to loose some fat and gain some power (why not?) make sure your metabolic state is correct first.

The principle of eating before your workout is universal and doesn't need any source. In case you dont believe me, here's an article about nutrition and swimmers. http: [bcst.com]

Keep brain fit with Alcohol

[El_Smack (267329)]

Alcohol kills brain cells, it's true. But it kills the weakest and most poorly adapted ones, just like Darwin says. That leaves your good brain cells unencumbered by the dead weight cells and they can function at full capacity.
That's why you get so much smarter when you drink.
Stolen and paraphrased from someone much funnier than I am.

Re:Keep brain fit with Alcohol

[cephyn (461066)]

um...wouldnt that be 10 kinds of cars in the world?

Re:Keep brain fit with Alcohol

[jebell (567579)]

um...wouldnt that be 10 kinds of cars in the world?

You obviously don't remember what number was painted on the General Lee.

My personal regimen

[RealProgrammer (723725)]

I start the day off with a brisk walk.

For breakfast, I have two eggs, fried in olive oil, with chives or onions.

Then I work a while on my bicycle. It has a fork for extra spice, and a three cheeses for more gondola.

I remember putting together my Heathkit computer, with the round things and the keyboard. We didn't have mice back then, except in the basement. Now they come in everywhere, and I can't seem to trap them.

I think I'll lay down a while.

From TFA....

[gmletzkojr (768460)]

YOUR brain is the greediest organ in your body,...

I'm not quite sure if that is correct.....

Since we're sharing, here's my morning routine....

[Rude Turnip (49495)]

I'm 28 years old. I believe in taking care of myself, and a balanced diet and a rigorous exercise routine. In the morning, if my face is a little puffy, I'll put on an ice pack while doing my stomach crunches. I can do a thousand now. After I remove the ice pack, I use a deep pore cleanser lotion. In the shower, I use a water activated gel cleanser. Then a honey almond body scrub. And on the face, an exfoliating gel scrub. Then apply an herb mint facial mask, which I leave on for 10 minutes while I prepare the rest of my routine. I always use an aftershave lotion with little or no alcohol, because alcohol dries your face out and makes you look older. Then moisturizer, then an anti-aging eye balm followed by a final moisturizing protective lotion. There is an idea of a Rude Turnip, some kind of abstraction, but there is no real me. Only an entity, something illusory. And though I can hide my cold gaze, and you can shake my hand and feel flesh gripping yours and maybe you can even sense our life styles are probably comparable, I simply am not there.

Re:Since we're sharing, here's my morning routine.

[dvdungeon (761065)]

And then a nice stress free day of murdering with axes, chainsaws and nailguns...

The dreadful consequences

[RealProgrammer (723725)]

Two older couples are out for a walk. The men are walking behind the women.

Man 1: We ate at a great restaurant last night.

Man 2: Oh really? Which one.

Man 1: The name escapes me right now ... what's the name of that flower, you know, with the thorns?

Man 2: A rose?

Man 1: Yes, that's it. Rose, where did we eat last night?

Re:The dreadful consequences

[iminplaya (723125)]

An 80-year-old couple is having trouble remembering things, so they go
to the doctor to make sure there's nothing wrong.
After an exam, the doctor says, "You're physically okay, but you guys
might want to start writing notes to help you remember things."
That night they're watching TV when the old man gets up from his chair.
His wife says, "Where are you going?"
He says, "I'm going to the kitchen to get a glass of water."
She says, "Will you get me some Vanilla ice cream?"
He says, "All right."
She says, "Don't you

Ways to live to 120

[WillAffleckUW (858324)]

1. Eat oatmeal for breakfast - if you must add sugars, make them complex, not processed (e.g. raw).

2. Get half an hour exercise each day, which basically means take the stairs or take the bus or if you drive don't park so close to work.

3. Get eight to nine hours sleep a night - this is the hard one for me. If you run a sleep deficit, sleep in Saturday morning, but wake up the usual time on Sunday.

4. For guys, drink one to two glasses of red wine with meals. For women, one-half to one, but depends on body mass.

5. Stop watching the news. All those car chases and crashes five states away just add to stress and you can't do anything about them. If you must watch, choose a less exciting program like PBS or such.

6. Ditch your watch and cellphone. Really.

7. Do crossword puzzles or something that engages your brain most every day. You meet a lot of cute girls that way ...

8. Don't be in such a rush. Biologically, we're not built to live like that.

9. Eat low on the food chain - how you do this is up to you, but avoid processed foods.

All the rest is commentary.

huh?

[justforaday (560408)]

You are what you eat, and that includes your brain.

Are they suggesting that I eat my own brain to become really smart?!?

Uh oh...

[by Anonymous Coward]

Beans are also a good source of fibre, and other research has shown a link between a high-fibre diet and improved cognition. If you can't stomach beans before midday, wholemeal toast with Marmite makes a great alternative.

My God... That's the alternative? Marmite or beans on toast in the morning? I think I'm better off staying stupid until after lunch.

Exercise exercise exercise!

[by Anonymous Coward]

If you are not doing it now start. I would rank this even higher than a healthy diet. If you jog or do rhythmic exercise that creates a meditative state, you get a double bonus. Everything starts with that. You can try the "smart" drugs and the mental exercises after you get your sorry ass off the couch. Exercise is the best mental tonic I've found.

psychology

[Andronoid (816502)]

as a graduate student in psychology I am upset by the frequent unscientific articles posted on slashdot relating to my field. Here are a couple of points that I think need to be made:

1. All of you probably know this but I'll just emphasize the point: "correlation is not causation."

2. All these "facts" are based on very questionable statistical techniques. I won't go into these techniques here but the idea in these experiments is that you want to make sure the effect of some manipulated variable is above chance (statistical significance). There are two ways to do this: have a large effect (e.g. eating breakfast causes a 10% increase in IQ) or just get lots of people so that even a small effect is not very likely by chance (e.g. eating breakfast causes a .000001% increase in IQ but in 10,0000) people. I can assure most of the results reported in this article are based on studies that are closer to the later method than the former. Furthermore this .00001% increase (is in the previous example) is an AVERAGE. That it is, for you in particular eating breakfast may even decrease your IQ. That is, infering something is true about an individual from the group that individual belongs to is a fallacy. There's even a name for this fallacy (the ecological fallacy).

3. Finding a brain area that is "activated" (fMRI) during a certain cognitive task is about as unexciting as learning that people use their hands to perform a physical task. OF COURSE, there is some area (or mostly likely areas) of the brain that is used in cognitive task just as of course there are areas of the body that perform "physical" tasks. Furthermore, it's unclear if "activation" should mean anything at all. Activation is defined as some small change in blood flow (which is correlated with neural activity) as measured via the oxygen levels picked up by a fMRI machine. Again, these difference results just need to be statistically significant to get published so that who knows what that meeds for individuals.

Little offtopic but shoddy science is the bane of all true geeks damn it.

Re:psychology

[Andronoid (816502)]

true enough for this article. I guess I'm just commenting on a more general trend I see of bad neuroscience and psychology on slashdot and the mainstream media (as well as in the field). These studies aren't neccessarily bad but the way they are discussed often is.

http://www.jsmf.org/about/s/badneuro/archive.htm [jsmf.org]

Stupid is as stupid does

[Scrameustache (459504)]

According to research published in 2003, kids breakfasting on fizzy drinks and sugary snacks performed at the level of an average 70-year-old in tests of memory and attention.

Maybe that's because they are being raised by the kind of parents that feed their kids cola and candy for breakfast?

This may seem like a wierd one..

[twifosp (532320)]

But go to the dentist. Seriously.

I avoided going to the dentist for about 3 years because I didn't feel I needed to. My teeth were straight, white and my gums looked healthy. I flossed 3-5 times a week, brushed twice a day, and used listerine all the time.

I started developing headaches and went to go see a doctor. After trying a few things and nothing helping, he suggested that based on the region of my head pain, I should see a dentist to make sure I wasn't afflicted with grinding, or other teeth issues.

Lo and behold I had an itty bitty bacteria infection on one of my back teeth and gums. It never hurt. It never stank. The dentist remarked for not having been to the dentist in a while, my mouth was remarkably clean of plaque and tartar.

After recieving treatment I noticed an unsuspected side effect. I had more energy. I slept better. It was quite noticable too. My next visit back to the dentist, I inquired and his explanation was quite logical. Your mouth is obviously a breeding ground for bacteria both good and bad. What's in your mouth is basically in your whole body. If you have bacteria in your mouth, your immune system has to work just that much harder to keep you healthy.

An odd anecdote but I'd thought I'd share none the less. It might seem like a no brainer to keep your mouth clean, but even those who follow all the "rules" can experience bacteria spots that affect your overall health and energy levels.

pills

[zoftie (195518)]

What is disturbing is that article talks about pills in the first bit. A sales pitch for drug pushing companies? Thanks but I'll stick to my diet and gym/kung-fu routine.

Re:Step 12

[Ford Prefect (8777)]

12. Ignore everything you read on Slashdot!

Okay!

Um...

Re:Step 12

[orasio (188021)]

12. Ignore everything you read on Slashdot!


But that would leave me with 11 steps again. And then I would read you, and get 12 steps again. And then I would have 11. Ohh, the paradox.

Re:Breakfast?

[nightskier (886235)]

I have been experimenting with the breakfast part For years, I had been skipping breakfast. A month ago, I decided to start eating a daily breakfast high in protein and complex carbs. Subjectively, I feel a lot better. I have more energy throughout the day, I'm less stressed, and my memory has improved. Being a geek, I decided to do some benchmarking. Before starting the diet, I purchase a book of crossword puzzles. I completed half of the puzzles over a period of a few weeks (one a day). I timed how long it took me to finish each puzzle. Two weeks ago I started attempting the puzzles again. My times have improved by more than 20 percent.

Re:Breakfast?

[jebell (567579)]

Don't take this the wrong way, but you take geek-ness to a whole new level.

Re:Breakfast?

[mESSDan (302670)]

Isn't it possible that your times improved because you were more experienced at crossword puzzles?

Re:Breakfast?

[NanoGator (522640)]

"Two weeks ago I started attempting the puzzles again. My times have improved by more than 20 percent."

Yeah, they go a lot quicker if you've done them already. ;)

Re:Breakfast?

[EastCoastSurfer (310758)]

You hit on the biggest problem. Most people sit around and don't exercise at all.

Do what I do...

[th3space (531154)]

Take it with you to work! Seriously, I used to skip breakfast, grab some fast food at lunch, and go out to dinner almost every night, and I felt sluggish, worn down, and found that my grasp over my mental faculties was slipping...so, around a year ago, I hit reset on my life and diet, and I've felt better - in every way - ever since.

By preparing all of my daily meals on my own with fresh ingredients (including making my own snacks), I've lost weight and body fat (I'm at a very trim 173lbs with 10% body fat...almost as good a condition as I was in when I played baseball and soccer year-round back in high school), I've had far more energy, and I've been sharper and more on the ball in my day to day doings at work and at play (hobbies and such). I also started an exercise regime that has further improved my conditioning and stamina and energy level, and have been a happier person for it.

My meals are all balanced to come out as close to what we're supposed to be taking in on a daily basis according to doctors recommendations (caloric intake, vitamins, minerals, etc, etc, etc). I snack exclusively on fruits and vegetables. My breakfast includes a variety of fruits and homemade granola mixed in with a serving of plain yogurt, and I'm able to take that with me to work to eat while I go over my start of day emails and voicemails. My lunches are good sized, but never too large, and the same goes with my dinners. I've cut back on the amount of red meat and pork that I take in, and have increased the amount of fish and chicken....like I said, I hit reset entirely.

I don't mean to sound like I'm preaching or whatever, but I really do believe that there is a lot to be said for eating well and taking care of yourself...I still smoke and have the odd pint of beer here and there, but even those bad habits have decreased nearly to the point of being non-existant.

In short, eat breakfast...you can still eat well, have it taste good, and be good for you if you 'wake up late' and are 'running behind'...hell, you'll find you might even sleep more soundly and wake up more readily if you change your diet.

note: As an aside, and this may or may not be something you would be interested in...a side-effect of my healthier living has been an increase in both my libido and in my performance...couple that with a healthier living sig-o, and you've got a pretty nifty little sex life going. Fruits and vegetables help a lot, from what I understand...in more areas than just performance and stamina. I'm just sayin', is all...

Breakfast like a king

[Colin Smith (2679)]

"Breakfast like a king, lunch like a prince, and dinner like a pauper."

Anyway. Eat when you need the energy. Eating in the evening when you don't need the energy just leaves you hungry in the morning. Something with whole grain to provide energy for several hours and maybe fish.

Omega-3 fats have been shown to make a significant difference to heart disease and mental ability. Fish oils or flax seed oils. It seems that the human diet may have contained a lot of fish historically. A kipper for breakfast may

Re:Okay for the nun part but...

[Concerned Onlooker (473481)]

(looking down) I may have a few "hardware" problems. At least nuns don't have to shave.

You know, you're not required to shave down there.

Re:beans?

[M. Baranczak (726671)]

It's a British publication - what did you expect?

Accurate label on your post, there

[ianscot (591483)]

And don't miss breakfast. This is why the United States is a nation of fat slobs. Nutritional experts telling everyone they need to eat like an adolescent during his growth spurt. Most people don't need breakfast or lunch either for that matter.

Gee, that's funny, essentially every nutritionist not moaning under a cultish trance over some Atkins variant would say dinner's the one to cut back on, but to get a healthy breakfast above all else. It's a conspiracy of experts, as you say. (Please ignore the obvious fact that Americans have never managed to follow this advice from the nutritionists all that well.)

All that is required is a diet with a reasonable amount of high quality protein.

I understand the appeal of contrarian positions, but you're just an Atkins fanboy. That diet, and all its many corollary marketed materials, exist for nutritionists on the same level that "intelligent design" does for biologists. You've successfully regurgitated your share of the sophisms, so call it a day. Go grill a steak.