UCLA launches major mental health study collecting & analyzing data from Apple wearables to better understand depression and anxiety

By SharpBrains | August 11, 2020

Apple and UCLA kick off a three-year depres­sion study (CNBC): UCLA on Tues­day said it is launch­ing a three-year study to bet­ter under­stand how fac­tors such as sleep, phys­i­cal activ­i­ty, heart rate and dai­ly rou­tines impact symp­toms of depres­sion and anx­i­ety. UCLA is work­ing with Apple to design the study, which will use data collected…

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

By SharpBrains | October 9, 2018

___ 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…

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Update: 200 common prescription medications increase depression risk

By SharpBrains | June 28, 2018

___ 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…

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

By SharpBrains | April 17, 2018 |

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…

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

By SharpBrains | February 23, 2018 |

___ 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…

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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 SharpBrains | June 23, 2017

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…

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