Do Crossword Puzzles and Bridge supply all the Brain exercise You Need?

This is a query we often get asked in our classes and lectures.

The quick reply is that while recreational activities like crossword puzzles, sudoku, bridge, chess, poker, etc. Are all good for you and better than doing nothing, they are ordinarily diminutive in their range of thinking cross-training as well as difficult to operate to ensure the right mixture of both challenge and novelty.

If you do them often, what you're doing is fun and can't hurt. But it may not be complete. Modern recommendations made by a panel of experts reviewing a poll by the American community on Aging stated "A particular activity, no matter how challenging, is not sufficient to preserve the kind of thinking acuity that virtually everyone can achieve."

Using your brain to solve creative challenges is perfect custom and will help slow down the effects of aging. The limitation with your current brain workout schedule is that it does not have sufficient variety or novelty to work out all your thinking muscles. Have you ever seen the guys in the gym with the buff upper bodies supported by diminutive chicken legs? The same thing can happen in your brain. Just as you cross-train in your corporal fitness disposition (mixing cardio with power training and flexibility) to get a balanced workout, you need to cross-train your thinking fitness to practice your brain through motor coordination, emotional understanding, memory, focus and attention, sensory processes, communication, language skills, and thinking visualization.

Furthermore, how can you gauge your improvement if you don't have a way to part it? Using computer software to give you a baseline score, workout routines for your brain, and consequent up tests gives you a part of your improvement. So basically, right now you may be doing a very focused workout using language and memory but with inconsistent challenge and diminutive feedback. A structured schedule should give you assessment, novelty, and performance-based challenge while still being fun. That extra thinking stimulation can growth the rate of neurogenesis, or the creation of new neurons and the connections in the middle of neurons.

A randomized controlled double-blind study published in August 2006 "demonstrates that intensive, plasticity-engaging training can consequent in an enhancement of cognitive function in general mature adults." provocative cognitive function leads to learning and neurogenesis. So keep doing crosswords and sudoku, especially if you enjoy them, but don't neglect the rest of your brain!

Conclusion: Do activities you enjoy, but be sure to do things that challenge you with new and separate types of stimulation.

Further Reading

- Gamon D. And Bragdon A. Construction thinking Muscle: Conditioning Exercises for the Six brain Zones (Walker & Company; 2003). Isbn: 0802776698

- Mahncke Hw, Connor Bb, Appelman J, et al. Memory enhancement in wholesome older adults using a brain plasticity-based training program: a randomized, controlled study. Proc Natl Acad Sci Usa. 2006;103:12523-8.

- Scarmeas N, Stern Y. Cognitive preserve and lifestyle. J Clin Exp Neuropsychol. 2003;25:625-33.

- Willis Sl, Tennstedt Sl, Marsiske M, et al. Long-term effects of cognitive training on daily functional outcomes in older adults. Jama. 2006;296:2805-14.

Copyright (c) 2007 SharpBrains

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Are Crossword Puzzles enough to Boost Your Brain Power?

You may have heard that solving crossword puzzles daily is a great way to advance your brain cells. It is sure to be helpful. But scientists have also learned that the brain needs new experiences to be at its best. Merely doing the same thing over and over is not as sufficient as you might think.

Sharpbrains.com is a research and advisory firm dedicated to helping individuals, fellowships and condition providers stay on top of the most recent research in brain fitness. Their site gives this marvelous advice:

"The point of having a brain is positively to learn and to adapt to fascinating new environments. Once new neurons appear in your brain, where they stay in your brain and how long they survive depends on how you use them. 'Use It or Lose It' does not mean 'do crossword puzzle estimate 1,234,567.' It means, 'challenge your brain often with fundamentally new activities.'"

The well-known seniors' organization,formerly known as the connection for the Advancement of Retired Persons, quotes Dr. Lawrence Katz of Duke University medical Center. He believes that when we go straight through the same routines day after day, the brain performance required to do these tasks positively decreases. But when we engage in new activities, or even changes in our routines, we are triggering parts of the brain that weren't used before. This creates "enhanced performance in the brain."

RevolutionHealth.com has compiled a list of recommendations from neuroscientists on the best activities to boost our brain health. Among the recommendations: activities should teach you something new, they should be challenging, they should be progressively more difficult, and they should be rewarding.

So how do crossword puzzles fit in? If you are doing crossword puzzles that are increasingly difficult and if you find it rewarding, your pastime may be beneficial. But if you are repeatedly solving "Easy Crosswords" from the newsstand and you find it to be tedious, the benefit may be limited.

What should you do if you positively love word puzzles, but you want more brain stimulation than you're receiving from your crosswords? Try something new! Try other clue-based and wordplay puzzles. Try logic puzzles. Try estimate puzzles. Try whatever that is fun, fascinating and new.

© 2008 Ann Richmond Fisher

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