Physical-activity

Study: Only 5% of US children ages 8–11 follow screen time, sleep and exercise guidelines recommended for brain development

by

___

Lim­it­ing chil­dren’s screen time linked to bet­ter cog­ni­tion, study says (CNN):

“Lim­it­ing kids’ recre­ation­al screen time to less than two hours a day, along with suf­fi­cient sleep and phys­i­cal activ­i­ty, is asso­ci­at­ed with improved cog­ni­tion, accord­ing to a study pub­lished in The Lancet Child & Ado­les­cent Health.

The study includ­ed about 4,500 US chil­dren ages 8 to 11 and mea­sured their habits against the Cana­di­an 24-Hour Move­ment Guide­lines for Chil­dren and Youth. It found that [Read more…] about Study: Only 5% of US chil­dren ages 8–11 fol­low screen time, sleep and exer­cise guide­lines rec­om­mend­ed for brain development

Update: 200 common prescription medications increase depression risk

by

___

Dear read­er,

Time for Sharp­Brains e‑newsletter.

It’s been a busy month, once again bring­ing to the fore­front the lim­i­ta­tions of our cur­rent health­care sys­tem and, on the pos­i­tive side, the grow­ing oppor­tu­ni­ties to improve Brain Health and Men­tal Health for all, if we pay atten­tion to (and act on) lat­est research, think­ing and tools.

New research:

New thinking:

New tools:

 

Final­ly, we invite you to tease your mind with these four opti­cal illu­sions. Sur­pris­ing, aren’t they?

Have a great month of July,

 

The Sharp­Brains Team

The more hours you sit per day, the smaller your medial temporal lobe (MTL) seems to become, brain scans show

by

—– In the study, both (A) Total medi­al tem­po­ral lobe (MTL) and (B) parahip­pocam­pal thick­ness cor­re­lat­ed inverse­ly with hours of sitting/day, con­trol­ling for age. Ref­er­ence: Sid­darth P et al (2018), Seden­tary behav­ior asso­ci­at­ed with reduced medi­al tem­po­ral lobe thick­ness in mid­dle-aged and old­er adults. PLOS ONE 13(4): e0195549.

Sit­ting is bad for your brain — not just your metab­o­lism or heart (UCLA release):

“UCLA researchers recruit­ed 35 peo­ple ages 45 to 75 and asked about their phys­i­cal activ­i­ty lev­els and the aver­age num­ber of hours per day they spent sit­ting over the pre­vi­ous week. Each per­son had a high-res­o­lu­tion MRI scan, which pro­vides a detailed look at the medi­al tem­po­ral lobe, or MTL, a brain region involved in the for­ma­tion of new memories.

The researchers found that seden­tary behav­ior is a sig­nif­i­cant pre­dic­tor of thin­ning of the MTL and [Read more…] about The more hours you sit per day, the small­er your medi­al tem­po­ral lobe (MTL) seems to become, brain scans show

To maximize cognitive benefits, study suggests you exercise brain and body at the same time

by

___

Phys­i­cal and men­tal mul­ti­task­ing may boost mem­o­ry, study sug­gests (UCLA research alert):

“Per­form­ing mem­o­ry train­ing exer­cis­es at the same time as ped­al­ing a sta­tion­ary bike led to bet­ter gains in mem­o­ry than doing the train­ing exer­cis­es after work­ing up a sweat, accord­ing to a 55-per­son study led by UCLA researchers. The find­ings sug­gest that exer­cise may tem­porar­i­ly make it eas­i­er for the brain to cre­ate new mem­o­ries [Read more…] about To max­i­mize cog­ni­tive ben­e­fits, study sug­gests you exer­cise brain and body at the same time

Cognitive Training or Gingko Biloba to prevent cognitive decline and dementia? New comprehensive report by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine clarifies priorities for public health and for future research

by

Evi­dence Sup­port­ing Three Inter­ven­tions That Might Slow Cog­ni­tive Decline and the Onset of Demen­tia Is Encour­ag­ing but Insuf­fi­cient to Jus­ti­fy a Pub­lic Health Cam­paign Focused on Their Adop­tion (Nation­al Acad­e­mies of Sci­ences, Engi­neer­ing, and Medicine):

“Cog­ni­tive train­ing, blood pres­sure man­age­ment for peo­ple with hyper­ten­sion, and increased phys­i­cal activ­i­ty all show mod­est but incon­clu­sive evi­dence that they can help pre­vent cog­ni­tive decline and demen­tia, but there is insuf­fi­cient evi­dence to sup­port a pub­lic health cam­paign encour­ag­ing their adop­tion, says a new report from the Nation­al Acad­e­mies of Sci­ences, Engi­neer­ing, and Med­i­cine. Addi­tion­al research is need­ed to fur­ther under­stand and gain con­fi­dence in their effec­tive­ness, said the com­mit­tee that con­duct­ed the study and wrote the report [Read more…] about Cog­ni­tive Train­ing or Gingko Bilo­ba to pre­vent cog­ni­tive decline and demen­tia? New com­pre­hen­sive report by the Nation­al Acad­e­mies of Sci­ences, Engi­neer­ing, and Med­i­cine clar­i­fies pri­or­i­ties for pub­lic health and for future research

Study: Physically-active video games (‘exergames’) boost cognition more than physical activity alone

by

—

Active gam­ing is good for brain health and mem­o­ry, finds study (Uni­ver­si­ty of Man­ches­ter release):

“Video games which involve phys­i­cal activ­i­ty sig­nif­i­cant­ly boost our brain health as we get old­er, accord­ing to new research led by Uni­ver­si­ty of Man­ches­ter experts.

Study authors Dr Emma Stan­more and Joseph Firth say sys­tems that use phys­i­cal activ­i­ty for gam­ing such as Wii, and Xbox Kinect can boost brain func­tion­ing in peo­ple with [Read more…] about Study: Phys­i­cal­ly-active video games (‘exergames’) boost cog­ni­tion more than phys­i­cal activ­i­ty alone