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UCLA

Update: The placebo effect works even when people know they are taking a placebo

August 27, 2020 by Alvaro Fernandez

Wel­come to a new edi­tion of Sharp­Brains’ e‑newsletter, fea­tur­ing 14 research find­ings, resources and tips for brain health … and start­ing with this fas­ci­nat­ing study:

#1. Wow. The place­bo effect works even when peo­ple know they are tak­ing a placebo

#2. Beat­ing Alzheimer’s Dis­ease will require a com­bined physical/ men­tal approach: From the ten fac­tors found to increase AD risk in the most com­pre­hen­sive evi­dence review to date,
  • Five are “neck up:” Low­er edu­ca­tion lev­el, Low­er cog­ni­tive activ­i­ty, Head trau­ma, Repeat­ed episodes of depres­sion, High-lev­els of long-term stress.
  • Five are “neck down:” Hyper­ten­sion in mid-life, Ortho­sta­t­ic hypoten­sion, Dia­betes, High BMI, High lev­els of homo­cys­teine. Sys­tem­at­ic review finds ten lifestyle fac­tors that clear­ly impact the prob­a­bil­i­ty of devel­op­ing Alzheimer’s dis­ease (AD)

#3. “The health­i­est peo­ple are the ones who grow with age and expe­ri­ence; even in times of trou­ble like these.” — Dhar­ma Singh Khal­sa, MD, Pres­i­dent of the Alzheimer’s Research and Pre­ven­tion Foun­da­tion. On Stress, Yoga Med­i­ta­tion, and The Evo­lu­tion Revolution

#4. “Accep­tance that Alzheimer’s dis­ease is a lifestyle dis­ease, lit­tle dif­fer­ent from oth­er age-relat­ed dis­eases, that is the sum of a life­time is the most impor­tant break­through of the decade.” — George Per­ry, PhD, Edi­tor-in-Chief of the Jour­nal of Alzheimer’s Dis­ease. High­er body mass index (BMI) linked to low­er blood sup­ply to the brain in large neu­roimag­ing study

#5. “Atten­tion is a scarce resource. Think about your atten­tion­al focus as the beam of a light. If the light is on an object it can­not be on oth­er objects at the same time with the same inten­si­ty … Although we typ­i­cal­ly have the feel­ing that mul­ti­task­ing saves us time, it is often not the case.” Sim­ple, quick brain teas­er to test the lim­its of multitasking

#6. If it appears to rotate, RT ? Fun opti­cal illu­sion to tease your mind

#7. Every cloud has a sil­ver lin­ing: How and when will the telemed­i­cine surge reach men­tal healthcare?

#8. Not a minute too soon: Mag­el­lan Health is test­ing biofeed­back videogame Might­i­er to help chil­dren bet­ter self-reg­u­late stress

#9. “In a time when emo­tions like stress, anx­i­ety, bore­dom, and anger are hard to avoid, a new study sug­gests that a par­tic­u­lar med­i­ta­tion prac­tice can help us face them.” Study: Med­i­ta­tion prac­tice, both for­mal and infor­mal, helps devel­op equa­nim­i­ty over time

#10. Ever since dis­cov­er­ing Bar­bara Arrow­smith-Young’s life tra­jec­to­ry via Nor­main Doidge’s fan­tas­tic book The Brain That Changes Itself, we have been impressed by her cre­ativ­i­ty, sta­mi­na and courage. Com­ing soon: Vir­tu­al World Tour at the fron­tier of applied neu­ro­plas­tic­i­ty, edu­ca­tion and learn­ing difficulties

#11. “Neur­al sig­nals will be used to devel­op algo­rithms that will help researchers deter­mine the opti­mal brain state under which indi­vid­u­als can receive infor­ma­tion. From there, the team will deter­mine the most effec­tive means of enhanc­ing the sub­jects’ abil­i­ty to intake and process infor­ma­tion. This could range from non-inva­sive neuromodulation—or brain stimulation—techniques to the use of aug­ment­ed real­i­ty to alter per­ceived envi­ron­men­tal con­di­tions.” Air Force announces research plat­form to har­ness closed-loop neu­rotech­nol­o­gy and accel­er­ate learn­ing “on the fly”

#12. Good to hear that “ensur­ing the pri­va­cy and secu­ri­ty of study par­tic­i­pants’ data is a high pri­or­i­ty for both UCLA and Apple. UCLA will process and main­tain study data in a secure envi­ron­ment … UCLA and Apple will ana­lyze the data only after they are cod­ed and stripped of names and oth­er con­tact infor­ma­tion.” UCLA launch­es major men­tal health study col­lect­ing & ana­lyz­ing data from Apple wear­ables to bet­ter under­stand depres­sion and anxiety

#13. Flex­i­bil­i­ty is good except when it isn’t: Study finds how sci­en­tists can reach dif­fer­ent con­clu­sions ana­lyz­ing the same brain scans

#14. “I have so much to accom­plish today that I must med­i­tate for two hours instead of one” — Gand­hi, as quot­ed in Sev­en evi­dence-based rea­sons to start med­i­tat­ing yesterday

Wish­ing you a safe and healthy September,

Alvaro Fer­nan­dez on behalf of the Sharp­Brains Team

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Filed Under: Brain/ Mental Health, Education & Lifelong Learning Tagged With: Alzheimer’s Disease, Apple, attentional focus, Barbara Arrowsmith-Young, brain, brain health, Brain Teasers, brain-teaser, meditation, mental healthcare, neural signals, neuroimaging, neuromodulation, Neurotechnology, non-invasive, optical illusion, placebo, Placebo-Effect, research, Stress, tease your mind, telemedicine, UCLA

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

August 11, 2020 by SharpBrains

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 by the iPhone, Apple Watch and Bed­dit sleep-track­er … involves 150 par­tic­i­pants recruit­ed from among UCLA Health patients. From there, the next phas­es of the research will expand out to 3,000 par­tic­i­pants from both the hos­pi­tal and the stu­dent body. Study par­tic­i­pants will down­load an app onto their iPhones, then receive a Bed­dit sleep mon­i­tor and an Apple Watch, which they can use through­out the study.

[Read more…] about UCLA launch­es major men­tal health study col­lect­ing & ana­lyz­ing data from Apple wear­ables to bet­ter under­stand depres­sion and anxiety

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Filed Under: Brain/ Mental Health, Peak Performance, Technology & Innovation Tagged With: anxiety, Apple, Apple Watch, Beddit, depression, Depression Grand Challenge, digital exhaust, heart-rate, iPhone, mental health, Mindstrong Health, Physical-activity, sleep, sleep-tracker, smartphones, study, UCLA

Time to adopt Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy (MBCT) as a public health intervention to ease depression?

October 15, 2018 by Greater Good Science Center

___

As near­ly 10,000 fresh­men and trans­fers arrived on cam­pus at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Cal­i­for­nia, Los Ange­les, last fall, they were invit­ed to try some­thing nev­er before offered dur­ing stu­dent ori­en­ta­tion: depres­sion screening.

The hope, admin­is­tra­tors explained, is that by iden­ti­fy­ing their risk for depres­sion, stu­dents can get the sup­port they need before they face the rig­ors of acad­e­mia and the dis­ori­ent­ing expe­ri­ence of liv­ing away at col­lege. [Read more…] about Time to adopt Mind­ful­ness-Based Cog­ni­tive Ther­a­py (MBCT) as a pub­lic health inter­ven­tion to ease depression?

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Filed Under: Brain/ Mental Health, Education & Lifelong Learning Tagged With: cognitive-therapy, depression, depression screening, Mental-Health, mindfulness, mindfulness-based cognitive therapy, public-health, UCLA

Next week in LA, and online: Brain Longevity Therapy Training by The Alzheimer’s Research & Prevention Foundation

October 10, 2017 by SharpBrains

_______

Heads-up: The Alzheimer’s Research & Pre­ven­tion Foun­da­tion (ARPF), a long­stand­ing sup­port­er of Sharp­Brains events and activ­i­ties, will be con­duct­ing its first Brain Longevi­ty Ther­a­py Train­ing — com­bin­ing pro­fes­sion­al devel­op­ment with a cer­ti­fi­ca­tion process — next week in Los Ange­les, CA (also with a livestream option).

And they are gen­er­ous­ly shar­ing dis­count codes (below) for inter­est­ed Sharp­Brains read­ers. [Read more…] about Next week in LA, and online: Brain Longevi­ty Ther­a­py Train­ing by The Alzheimer’s Research & Pre­ven­tion Foundation

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Filed Under: Brain/ Mental Health, Education & Lifelong Learning Tagged With: aging, Alzheimer's Research Prevention Foundation, baby-boomers, Brain Longevity Therapy Training, brain-longevity, older-adults, successful aging, training, UCLA, UCLA Campus

Reminder: Brain Longevity Therapy Training, by The Alzheimer’s Research & Prevention Foundation, to take place October 19th-22nd

September 11, 2017 by SharpBrains

_______

The Alzheimer’s Research & Pre­ven­tion Foun­da­tion (ARPF), a long­stand­ing sup­port­er of Sharp­Brains events and activ­i­ties, will be con­duct­ing its first Brain Longevi­ty Ther­a­py Train­ing — com­bin­ing pro­fes­sion­al devel­op­ment with a cer­ti­fi­ca­tion process — dur­ing 4 days late Octo­ber in Los Ange­les, CA (also with a livestream option). And they are gen­er­ous­ly shar­ing dis­count codes for inter­est­ed Sharp­Brains read­ers (see below) [Read more…] about Reminder: Brain Longevi­ty Ther­a­py Train­ing, by The Alzheimer’s Research & Pre­ven­tion Foun­da­tion, to take place Octo­ber 19th-22nd

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Filed Under: Brain/ Mental Health, Education & Lifelong Learning Tagged With: aging, Alzheimer's Research Prevention Foundation, baby-boomers, Brain Longevity Therapy Training, brain-longevity, older-adults, successful aging, training, UCLA, UCLA Campus

October 19–22nd: First Brain Longevity Therapy Training by The Alzheimer’s Research & Prevention Foundation

September 1, 2017 by SharpBrains

_______

Heads-up: The Alzheimer’s Research & Pre­ven­tion Foun­da­tion (ARPF) will be con­duct­ing its first Brain Longevi­ty Ther­a­py Train­ing — com­bin­ing pro­fes­sion­al devel­op­ment with a cer­ti­fi­ca­tion process — dur­ing 4 days late Octo­ber in Los Ange­les, CA (also with a livestream option). [Read more…] about Octo­ber 19–22nd: First Brain Longevi­ty Ther­a­py Train­ing by The Alzheimer’s Research & Pre­ven­tion Foundation

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Filed Under: Brain/ Mental Health, Education & Lifelong Learning Tagged With: aging, Alzheimer's Research Prevention Foundation, baby-boomers, Brain Longevity Therapy Training, brain-longevity, older-adults, successful aging, training, UCLA, UCLA Campus

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