Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
Dean Regas here, astronomer and host of Looking Up. I journey to the far reaches of the universe, hearing from scientists, astronauts, and geeky celebs along the way. We cover everything from black holes to the latest in science fiction. Listen now to the Looking Up podcast from the NPR Network and Cincinnati Public Radio. You're listening to Shortwave from NPR.
Hey, Shore Wavers. Here's some advice for all you fitness fanatics. Never skip brain day. That's right. It's time to talk about improving your cognitive fitness. And here to lead today's masterclass is NPR's resident brain trainer, John Hamilton. Hey, John.
Hey, Gina. Just finishing up my prefrontal reps here. Got to keep the old cortex shredded.
All right. Let me add that to the list of images I can't unsee. Okay, John. So what's cognitive fitness exactly? Like, are we talking Wordle? You know, because I'm pretty good at Wordle.
Nope.
Fine. What about quadratic equations? Numbers?
Nope.
What about like a few races in Mario Kart? Maybe those Zelda puzzles that I do?
Strike three. Those all focus on really narrow skills. You know, word recognition, number processing, throwing a turtle shell. Cognitive fitness is more of a whole brain workout. You're trying to build up these broad areas like working memory, processing speed, focus. By the way, those are functions that tend to get worse as we age.
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Chapter 2: What is cognitive fitness and why is it important?
It's easy, right?
Yeah, I can do this. I can do this. As you improve, the vehicles will disappear faster.
Okay, that one. Sign is here. Yep. That one. Sign's here.
This gets harder.
Okay, okay, okay. I wasn't looking. It's that one. Oh. Oh, I was way off. Oh, crap, crap, crap. Okay. That one. Sign's here. Happy brain training. Okay. That did get harder. It totally got harder.
Yeah, I could see that. I could see the smoke coming out of your ears. It was it was real.
I thought it was I was like it was like a false sense of security. I was like, oh, this is so easy. And then it just got like way harder.
But I mean, you get the idea, though, right? This this kind of training is a lot like, you know, serious athletic training. It's all about going for the mental burn. You know, you got to think Stairmaster set to 20.
It's all about reps, you know. Today on the show, cognitive workouts to keep your brain young.
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Chapter 3: What brain exercises can help prevent cognitive decline?
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So, John, this is where you tell me how my brain is going to stay young forever, just like my face.
Yeah.
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Chapter 4: How does the double decision task improve cognitive function?
Yeah. I mean, maybe not forever, but there is some cool new science here. Let me tell you about a study that provides the first really compelling evidence that cognitive training can cause biological changes in the brain.
OK, so like the brain's version of washboard abs.
Exactly. You've probably seen some of those brain training products on the Internet. You've got, you know, there's Lumosity, Elevate, Peak, Cognifit. And then there's the one that probably has the most science behind it. That is Brain HQ. They designed that training exercise that was making your head explode just a few minutes ago.
Until now, the evidence that those products actually work has been mostly from studies of cognitive performance. So, you know, maybe somebody was able to process information more quickly, focus for a longer period of time. This new study found changes in levels of a really important molecule in the brain. It's something called acetylcholine.
OK, I've never heard of that before, but it sounds cool.
And now you have.
OK, awesome.
Acetylcholine is both a neurotransmitter and a neuromodulator. So what it does is it carries messages around the brain, but it also affects the behavior of neurons. It neuromodulates. Unfortunately, as we get older, the levels of acetylcholine in the brain start to go down. And if you get Alzheimer's, they go way down.
Wow, OK.
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