We are pleased to announce that, after much hard work and three global sum­mits to dis­cuss the lat­est sci­ence and best prac­tices, The Sharp­Brains Guide to Brain Fit­ness: How to Opti­mize Brain Health and Per­for­mance at Any Age (April 2013; 284 pages), is now avail­able for pur­chase as paper­back ($15.95) and e-book ($9.95)!

(Editor’s Note: every month we host an online Q&A with par­tic­i­pants in the e-course How To Be Your Own Brain Fit­ness Coach. This is the lightly edited and anonymized tran­script from the Jan­u­ary Q&A ses­sion; the Feb­ru­ary Q&A will take place on Tues­day, Feb­ru­ary 12th)

2:02
OK, ready to go! Happy 2013 again. You can start writ­ing your ques­tions and com­ments in the box at the bot­tom, and hit Send.

2:04
Ques­tion 
Which activ­i­ties or games or web­sites do you rec­om­mend to improve mem­ory? Read the rest of this entry »

Reg­is­tered par­tic­i­pants in the new e-course How to Be Your Own Brain Fit­ness Coach can take part in a monthly online Q&A ses­sion to dis­cuss progress and open ques­tions with the course fac­ulty and with fel­low par­tic­i­pants. Below is the tran­script of the Octo­ber 30th Q&A ses­sion, lightly edited and anonymized.

Course Fac­ulty (or F): OK, we are ready to start. You can start writ­ing and sub­mit­ting any ques­tions and com­ments!  Read the rest of this entry »

Each blue dot below rep­re­sents a reg­is­tered par­tic­i­pant in the online course start­ing this Wednes­day, March 7th, How to Be Your Own Brain Fit­ness Coach in 2012. Reg­is­tra­tion is now closed, so if you are inter­ested in learn­ing about sim­i­lar offer­ings in the future, please sub­scribe  to our monthly Sharp­Brains eNewslet­ter. We’ll send final details today to every­one who reg­is­tered. Look­ing for­ward to a great and valu­able experience!

Let us share below a list of 40 com­mon brain fit­ness, brain health, brain train­ing ques­tions that we will make sure to address dur­ing the upcom­ing online course, How to Be Your Own Brain Fit­ness Coach in 2012 (starts March 7th). The ques­tions are sequenced by their approx­i­mate order of appear­ance in the syl­labus. We look for­ward to an engag­ing, inter­ac­tive and valu­able expe­ri­ence! ***Please remem­ber that course reg­is­tra­tion ends on Sun­day, March 4th.***

Top 40 Brain Fit­ness & Train­ing Questions

1. How can one define brain fitness
2. What is link between stress, focus and memory
3. Does “brain age” even exist
4. How to enhance over­all men­tal pro­duc­tiv­ity, vs just IQ
5. Is there some “ceil­ing” to my improve­ment or can I always try more things
6. How brain func­tions evolve with age. What improves, what declines, what should I be pay­ing atten­tion to Read the rest of this entry »

Here you have the syl­labus for upcom­ing online course How to Be Your Own Brain Fit­ness Coach. There are still some seats avail­able, so please take a look and reg­is­ter if interested.

Ses­sion I. Debunk­ing Brain and Brain Fit­ness Myths: We will first debunk pop­u­lar mis­con­cep­tions that stand in the way of mak­ing informed deci­sions to spend our time and money wisely. We will explore hot top­ics such as genet­ics vs. envi­ron­ment vs. lifestyle, intel­li­gence, left/ right brain hemi­spheres, “brain age”, cog­ni­tive enhance­ment, sup­ple­ments, learn­ing styles, brain train­ing, neu­ro­ge­n­e­sis, neu­ro­plas­tic­ity, cog­ni­tive reserve, and Alzheimer’s Dis­ease. Addi­tion­ally we’ll con­trast the find­ings from a major recent sci­en­tific study with their media cov­er­age, equip­ping par­tic­i­pants to become bet­ter informed read­ers of news and sci­en­tific findings.

When: Wednes­day, March 7th, 11am-1pm US Pacific Time (live ses­sion will be recorded for later view­ing). Read the rest of this entry »

Each blue dot in this map (you can click on it to expand it) rep­re­sents a reg­is­tered par­tic­i­pant in our upcom­ing online course, How to Be Your Own Brain Fit­ness Coach in 2012, start­ing on March 7th. Those dots rep­re­sent­ a fas­ci­nat­ing diver­sity of peo­ple and back­grounds: health and med­ical pro­fes­sion­als, edu­ca­tors, busi­ness exec­u­tives, traders, con­sul­tants, coaches, soft­ware engi­neers, ther­a­pists,  and more. Based on an ini­tial sur­vey, some seem most inter­ested in the sci­ence; some are most inter­ested in prac­ti­cal guide­lines and appli­ca­tions. The point of this course is to dis­cuss both. To Learn More, and to Reg­is­ter, Click Here.