Recently, there has been a surge of brain-training apps available to smartphone users. Apps such as Lumosity and Elevate are being used by\u00a0tens of millions<\/a>\u00a0of people around the world in an attempt to boost their brain health.<\/p>\n
However, the actual cognitive benefits of these brain-training apps have been called into question<\/a>. Some\u00a0studies\u00a0have found that brain-training games improve the brain function of young people<\/a>, and others claim to help preserve cognitive health in seniors<\/a>. There have also been studies carried out that claim these brain-training apps provide no cognitive benefits<\/a>.<\/p>\n
Stimulating the brain with activities and games when we are under the age of 65 can help to keep our mind healthy in later life. There are a number of online games and apps that can be played on a computer or smartphone; however, you don\u2019t need to use modern technology to give your brain a workout. Playing a simple board game like Chess or Scrabble, doing a matching game, or completing a jigsaw puzzle can all have significant cognitive benefits. Other puzzle-type games like word searches, Sudoku puzzles and crosswords are all mentally stimulating.<\/p>\n
If you are trying to find an activity that will stimulate your brain, look for something that will challenge your short-term memory, attention span, language, logic, reaction time, hand-eye coordination, and visual abilities. You can also simply add a brain-training workout to your everyday life, such as:<\/p>\n
In order to have the most impact on ageing, brain activity should also be backed up with a healthy lifestyle.<\/p>\n
Making any changes to your lifestyle can seem like a big change at first, but it doesn\u2019t have to be. Don\u2019t try to change everything at once. Start training your brain with one new activity. If you find yourself getting bored with that, try another one. Just don\u2019t give up.<\/p>\n
While you can do brain-training exercises to improve your overall cognitive health, there\u2019s no guarantee that these activities will prevent forms of dementia. It will also not cure certain forms of dementia, such as Alzheimer\u2019s disease. However, if dementia is tied directly to disease (such as uncontrolled type 2 diabetes), you can improve and manage the symptoms with medicine and healthy living.<\/p>\n
If you are concerned about declining mental capacity as you are ageing, don\u2019t worry. Occasional memory loss is normal as we get older. If you have dementia, however, memory loss gets worse over time and progresses at a quicker rate. Some of the most common signs that may indicate dementia in yourself or a loved one include:<\/p>\n
For more information on the content of this article, get in touch with the team at Brain Sparks.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Recently, there has been a surge of brain-training apps available to smartphone users. Apps such as Lumosity and Elevate are being used by\u00a0tens of millions\u00a0of people around the world in an attempt to boost their brain health. However, the actual cognitive benefits of these brain-training apps have been called into question. Some\u00a0studies\u00a0have found that brain-training […]\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":15307,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brainsparks.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15306"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brainsparks.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brainsparks.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brainsparks.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brainsparks.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15306"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.brainsparks.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15306\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brainsparks.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15307"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brainsparks.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15306"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brainsparks.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15306"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brainsparks.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15306"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}