Many of you may not be aware that Posit Science has launched another wonderful suite of brain fitness exercises, for visual training in BrainHQ, that focuses on improving visual perception, attention, memory/cognition, and fast-responding abilities (see www.positscience.com). We are very proud of this new training program suite. It was created with the help and assistance…
I spent a little time yesterday, describing the obvious virtues of our new <strong>INSIGHT</strong> brain fitness training program. Here’s two more: 1) Visual cognition is language independent. If your native language is German or Italian or Tagalog or Swahili or Bengali, it should work, for YOU! You need to read a little English to follow…
After long consideration, a jury (of one, your honorable scribe) has chosen Susanne Rust and Meg Kissinger of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinal as the winners of a prestigious “Merzie” in the category of Investigative Reporting for an article titled “EPA drops ball on danger of chemicals to children”, posted on March 29, 2008. This article…
Over the past decade, I have visited a large number of the great (and lesser) research institutions in the world where scientists are focused on practical (therapeutic) extensions of brain plasticity research. Especially over the past year, I’ve witnessed a great ground-swell of activity generated by scientists employing the principles of brain plasticity to drive…
You may have read (about a month ago) that a Cambridge University group tracked the life-spans of 20,000 Brits, as it was affected by a number of factors that plausibly relate to it. Those included: 1) Eating your fruits and veggies every day; 2) drinking a little wine and whiskey—but not TOO much, every day;…
Memory (cognitive ability, executive control, motor control, whatever) resides in a place(s). If we fix that (those) place(s), we fix memory (our failing faculties). For MEMORY, as an example, most scientists focus on one of three places: the hippocampus, for ‘episodic’ or ‘long-term memory’; the inferior/medial temporal or lateral frontal cortex, for ‘immediate’ or ‘working…
In early October, I attended a meeting sponsored by the National Institute on Aging and the McKnight Foundation considering the general subject of cognitive decline in aging populations. I found the meeting to be useful, and distressing. Useful, because this subject is now on the front burner for the NIA, just as it is for…
Traveling in Mexico and observing the operation of Mexican families has brought a simple question to my mind: Why are Mexican-American soldiers from the Iraq War significantly more susceptible than other ethnicities for developing post-traumatic stress disorders (PTSDs)? Does their “weakness” reflect genetic contributions to their risk for PTSD, or, more likely perhaps, does it…
About two weeks ago, Posit Science was visited by a family who appeared to have greatly benefited from the use of our exercises in BrainHQ. This family’s story began with a late-night boating accident involving a beloved young son, circa 20 years of age. The boat that Ryan was riding in was struck by a…