Want to improve your Health? Start by boosting your Brain Health

Our cog­ni­tion and men­tal well­be­ing are cru­cial fac­tors for our qual­i­ty of life and put us in a good posi­tion to con­tribute to soci­ety. Ulti­mate­ly, it can be near impos­si­ble to achieve phys­i­cal goals and demand­ing life chal­lenges if our brain health is not optimal.

Yet most of us appear to be more con­cerned with phys­i­cal health than brain health. Accord­ing to the YouGov web­site the most pop­u­lar New Year’s res­o­lu­tions in the UK in 2024 were doing more exer­cise, sav­ing mon­ey, los­ing weight and diet­ing – with about 20% report­ing they were fail­ing some res­o­lu­tions only just six days into the year. A large study of approx­i­mate­ly 1,000 par­tic­i­pants showed that men­tal health only fea­tured in about 5% of resolutions.

It’s easy to mon­i­tor your phys­i­cal health using mobile devices and wear­able tech­nol­o­gy to pre­serve phys­i­cal health through­out your life. It may be more unclear, how­ev­er, how to improve and mon­i­tor brain health and men­tal well­be­ing. In our new book Brain Boost: Healthy Habits for a Hap­pi­er Life, we draw on research to offer prac­ti­cal tips.

A num­ber of fac­tors con­tribute to our hap­pi­ness in life, includ­ing genet­ics, our social and phys­i­cal envi­ron­ment, cog­ni­tion and our behav­iour, such as lifestyle choic­es. Stud­ies have shown that good cog­ni­tive func­tion is relat­ed to bet­ter well­be­ing and happiness.

Inter­est­ing­ly, accord­ing to the 2024 World Hap­pi­ness Report all five Nordic coun­tries –Fin­land, Den­mark, Ice­land, Nor­way and Swe­den– are in the top 10 hap­pi­est coun­tries. The UK and the US, how­ev­er, do not fea­ture in the top 10.

In the UK, the YouGov web­site has been track­ing mood states and while it reports that hap­pi­ness is the most com­mon­ly expressed emo­tion, only 45% of peo­ple feel it. Ide­al­ly this num­ber should be much higher.

In addi­tion, feel­ing stressed and frus­trat­ed are the next top emo­tions with 40% and 35% of peo­ple hav­ing these feel­ings respec­tive­ly. Dis­ap­point­ing­ly, opti­mism is also low, for exam­ple, only 23% of 18–24 year-olds and over 75-year-olds feel opti­mistic on aver­age, and 17% of 45–54 year-olds.

Hap­pi­ness and well­be­ing in gen­er­al reduces the effects of stress and pro­motes health and longevity.

In our book, we draw on the lat­est sci­en­tif­ic evi­dence, includ­ing our own, to high­light sev­en essen­tial lifestyle fac­tors that improve our brain health, cog­ni­tion and well­be­ing. We demon­strate how sim­ple — and often sur­pris­ing —adjust­ments to our dai­ly habits can enhance brain fit­ness, boost cog­ni­tion, and pro­mote over­all wellbeing.

We sug­gest small incre­men­tal steps to improv­ing lifestyle habits and ensur­ing these fit with­in our dai­ly activ­i­ties, as well as being enjoy­able and plea­sur­able. In this way, we can ensure, that unlike New Year’s res­o­lu­tions that we give up with­in six days, we can main­tain these through­out life. This puts us in a bet­ter posi­tion to achieve phys­i­cal chal­lenges in the future.

These lifestyle fac­tors include exer­cise, diet, sleep, social inter­ac­tions, kind­ness, mind­ful­ness and learn­ing, and know­ing how to get the best out of work. For exam­ple, exer­cise is an “all-rounder”, as it can boost our phys­i­cal health but also our brain health, cog­ni­tion and mood. In fact, stud­ies have shown that exer­cise can increase the size of our hip­pocam­pus, which is crit­i­cal for learn­ing and memory.

Sim­i­lar­ly, sleep­ing the opti­mal num­ber of hours each night can improve our immune sys­tem, brain struc­ture and men­tal well­be­ing. Our own study showed that sleep­ing 7–8 hours per night in mid­dle to old­er adult­hood was asso­ci­at­ed with bet­ter brain struc­ture, cog­ni­tion, such as pro­cess­ing speed and mem­o­ry, and men­tal health.

Stay­ing social­ly con­nect­ed also plays an impor­tant role in our brain health. We have shown that being social­ly iso­lat­ed in old­er adults is asso­ci­at­ed with a 26% increased risk of demen­tia. Where­as, hav­ing the opti­mal num­ber of friends in ado­les­cence, about five, is linked with bet­ter brain struc­ture, cog­ni­tion, edu­ca­tion­al attain­ment and wellbeing.

Learn­ing new things is also essen­tial to keep the neur­al cir­cuits in our brain func­tion­ing at their best lev­el for as long as pos­si­ble. We need to chal­lenge our­selves men­tal­ly to keep our brains active – just as we need to do phys­i­cal exer­cise to keep our bod­ies fit.

This builds cog­ni­tive reserve and helps us in times of stress. We can also keep our brains active in a num­ber of ways, for exam­ple, by learn­ing a new lan­guage or how to play a musi­cal instru­ment or you can read an edu­ca­tion­al book about some­thing that inter­ests you.

Keep­ing our bod­ies healthy is incred­i­bly impor­tant. But we need to also nur­ture our brains if we want to be hap­py, men­tal­ly sharp and well pro­tect­ed against dis­eases such as dementia.

Embrac­ing these sim­ple strate­gies to pri­ori­tise our brain health and well­be­ing is essen­tial for a hap­pi­er and more ful­fill­ing life. Ulti­mate­ly, lifestyle choic­es play a sig­nif­i­cant role in reduc­ing stress and pro­mot­ing resilience, cre­ativ­i­ty and over­all qual­i­ty of life.

– Bar­bara Jacque­lyn Sahakian is a Pro­fes­sor of Clin­i­cal Neu­ropsy­chol­o­gy at Uni­ver­si­ty of Cam­bridge, and Chris­telle Lan­g­ley a Post­doc­tor­al Research Asso­ciate of Cog­ni­tive Neu­ro­science at Uni­ver­si­ty of Cam­bridge. This arti­cle was orig­i­nal­ly pub­lished on The Con­ver­sa­tion based on their new book Brain Boost: Healthy Habits for a Hap­pi­er Life.

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Masterclass: Boost Your Mental Fitness & Resilience to Thrive in the Modern Workplace

SHARPBRAINS Advisors is an independent think-tank and consulting firm providing services at the frontier of applied neuroscience, health, leadership and sustainability. Learn more about our upcoming Masterclass: Boost your Mental Fitness & Resilience to Thrive in the Modern Workplace.

About SharpBrains

SHARPBRAINS is an independent think-tank and consulting firm providing services at the frontier of applied neuroscience, health, leadership and innovation.
SHARPBRAINS es un think-tank y consultoría independiente proporcionando servicios para la neurociencia aplicada, salud, liderazgo e innovación.

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