Brain Fitness Games - Do They Deliver?
We are through the holidays and have jump-started into 2015! Did you receive any brain fitness games for Christmas from well-meaning kids or grandkids? Lumosity. BrainHQ. FitBrains and others did a lot of online marketing through the holiday season. The electronic market for brain fitness products is starting to explode. How does brain fitness/training games fit into the big picture of brain health?
In 2010 the National Institute of Health challenged the brain health industry to back their claims with reliable science. Since then the industry has been more structured in their research and have tempered their claims of success. This is a very good win for all of us buying these products.
BrainHQ is from Posit Science and promises better skills in attention, memory, brain speed, navigation, and intelligence. I was an Authorized Provider for Posit Science in the mid-2000s. Their products at that time were The Brain Fitness Program and Cortex with Insight. Because I was selling these programs I needed to experience them firsthand. I completed both programs and I have to say they made a significant difference in my life. What I was really interested in at that time was the science that supported the programs. The industry was just so new then. Posit Science delivered on their science and research. BrainHQ is the online program that offers brain fitness goals in a more efficient way than their predecessor programs.
Lumosity is probably the best-known program of the three presented. Again, research and development in neuroscience is critical to the success of the gaming format. Lumosity has strong research to support their games. They tackle memory, attention, problem solving, and impulse control among other specialized programs.
I work with Dr. Paul Nussbaum, the Chief Scientific Officer for FitBrains. Needless to say I use FitBrains everyday for my brain fitness needs. In September 2012 I had brain surgery. I struggled with extensive brain fog post-surgery. I had a very hard time with memory, attention and especially speed of processing. I was diligent using my FitBrains Trainer program everyday and found a huge improvement in my brain function.
Now there are a few caveats here. Our brains are experiencing cognitive decline as we age. When we are making these reversals in brain function – we need to continue with the training. We make gains while we are using the programs but we lose those gains pretty fast if we don’t continue.
Also, this is just the mental stimulation piece for healthy brains. If you don’t support these gains with exercise, nutrition, stress reduction, sleep, and being with other people – you cannot sustain a healthy brain. We are fortunate that neuroscience has made inroads into healthy brains by revealing that with effort we can reverse aging processes and increase cognitive resilience. We just need to understand that this is a big picture type of lifestyle and brain fitness games are just one piece.
Get involved with your training. The games are fun and challenging. You will notice a difference if you are persistent with your training. It is definitely worth the time and energy you put into it. You will get a lot more satisfaction back!
Happy Gaming!
Have questions or interested in learning more? Contact me at pcfaust@gmail.com