Can a mental workout stop aging brains?

31 Mar 2014

Irish Examiner Lifestyle journalist questions the benefits of 'Brain training apps and games'  with Professor John Cryan Department of Anatomy & Neuroscience UCC

Brain training apps and games are hugely popular but can they stop our brains ageing, asks Margaret Jennings. Is it all a cynical money-making exercise built on the proven scientific concept that our brains have more plasticity then we had first believed?

It’s important to separate the hype from the science, says John Cryan, professor at the department of anatomy and neuroscience at University College Cork.

“It’s quite a controversial field — there’s all sorts of info out there, especially of commercial interest, but as a neuroscientist the concept could work,” he says.

Prof Cryan points to a paper published last September in the respected journal Nature, which showed that playing video games had a positive impact on multi-tasking among 60 to 85-year-olds.

The researchers knew that multitasking performance on a video game (Neuro Racer) declined with age but by playing an adaptive version of the game in training mode, older adults aged 60 to 85 attained levels better than untrained 20-year-old participants and the gains persisted for six months, including showing a boost in sustained attention.

The researchers said it highlighted the “robust plasticity” of the ageing brain and was the first known evidence of how a custom-designed video game could be used to assess cognitive abilities across the lifespan and serve as a “powerful tool for cognitive enhancement”.

Prof Cryan sees this as an exciting development, noting that apps and brain training games on mobile devices demand the same skills such as attention, working memory, special navigation and planning.

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