A new study shows that cognitive training can increase levels of an important chemical messenger in the brain that is responsible for decision-making.
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Scientists have provided the first convincing evidence that mental activity can produce biological changes in the human brain. NPR’s Jon Hamilton reports on a new study that shows intensive cognitive training reverses a process associated with aging.
JON HAMILTON, BYLINE: The Internet is full of brain training programs that promise to improve thinking and memory. But Etienne de Villers-Sidani of McGill University in Canada says it’s hard to know whether they really work.
ETIENNE DE VILLERS-SIDANI: They had a positive impact on some cognitive measures, but then the question became: how much does it change the brain and how does it change the brain?
HAMILTON: So De Villers-Sidani and a team of researchers decided to find out whether mental training could increase levels of a chemical messenger closely linked to cognitive performance. It’s called acetylcholine. He says that levels tend to decline after middle age.
DE VILLERS-SIDANI: Every decade after the age of 40 or 45, there is a decline of about 2.5% in this neurotransmitter in important brain regions.
HAMILTON: The decline is much faster in people with Alzheimer’s disease. The researchers examined 92 healthy people who were at least 65 years old. According to De Villers-Sidani, half of the participants spent 30 minutes a day doing mental exercises during the 10-week study. These come from a science-backed cognitive training program called Brain HQ.
DE VILLERS-SIDANI: This is really focused on attention and processing speed and is characterized by the fact that it pushes you to your limits.
HAMILTON: By asking you to remember more and more in less and less time – other participants spent their time playing video games like Solitaire and Candy Crush. The researchers used a special type of PET scan to detect changes in acetylcholine levels. De Villers-Sidani says they focused on the anterior cingulate cortex, a brain region important for making decisions and detecting errors.
DE VILLERS-SIDANI: To be honest, I wasn’t sure if we would find anything.
HAMILTON: But they did. In people who played video games, acetylcholine levels remained unchanged. However, de Villers-Sidani says there was a significant increase in people who underwent cognitive training.
DE VILLERS-SIDANI: It was about 2.3%, which isn’t huge, but it’s significant when you consider that there’s a 2.5% decline per decade, usually just with age.
HAMILTON: At least in this area of the brain, cognitive training seemed to turn back the clock by about 10 years. Acetylcholine levels also increased in other brain areas, including the hippocampus, which plays a key role in memory. The study, funded by the National Institutes of Health, appears in the journal JMIR Serious Games. Michael Hasselmo, a neuroscientist at Boston University, says he was impressed by the result.
MICHAEL HASSELMO: It was convincing enough that I looked for the task myself and thought: Maybe I have to do this task.
HAMILTON: Hasselmo has spent much of his career researching acetylcholine, a chemical messenger that also modulates the behavior of neurons.
HASSELMO: If you block the neuromodulatory function in the brain with a drug like scopolamine, a person can’t even think. You basically fall into a state of delirium.
HAMILTON: Low levels of acetylcholine are a hallmark of Alzheimer’s disease and appear to contribute to declines in memory and thinking. However, Hasselmo says that even small increases in this neurotransmitter can noticeably improve cognitive function. He says a cup of coffee boosts levels enough to improve alertness and speed reactions.
HASSELMO: A 2.5% change in things could have a pretty profound and remarkable impact, even on a subjective level.
HAMILTON: Hasselmo says the first Alzheimer’s drugs relieve symptoms by increasing acetylcholine levels. Now it appears, he says, that hardcore brain training may provide similar benefits. Jon Hamilton, NPR News.
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