How much did you play Brain Training? A new study proves the age-defying benefits
Dr. Kawashima and Nintendo were right: brain-training games can actually have a significant positive effect and reduce the effects of aging on our brain. A new scientific study has found that as much as a decade of aging may be offset by our efforts playing them, which is good news if you spent a very long time playing Brain Training.
The key finding was that doing rigorous mental exercises for 30 minutes a day boosts the chemical messenger acetylcholine, which not only carries messages across the brain but improves learning, memory and attention functions. Acetylcholine levels typically deplete with age.
Dr Kawashima’s Brain Training for Nintendo Switch – Launch trailer Watch on YouTube
The study monitored 95 people over the age of 65 years for 10 weeks and found a 2.3 percent rise in acetylcholine after doing brain training exercises for 30 minutes a day. As NPR noted in an article about the report, 2.3 percent doesn’t sound enormous, but when you consider there’s usually a decrease of 2.5 percent due to aging, it reframes the discovery. Brain-training games may offset as much as a decade of degradation caused by aging.
