As we age there are physical changes in the brain. These changes start in our 20’s.However, the effects are not really apparent until the 40’s and later.
However after a while we start to notice things such as our memory is not so good and we have more difficulty focusing on just one task.
Find out how you can slow the rate of age-related changes in your brain, and simple ways to compensate for the changes.
Judith Airey, a biomedical researcher, has a PhD in Cell & Molecular Biology and is a faculty member at a Medical School.
Like most of us, Judith wants to know what will keep her healthy and young looking as she ages. With her science background and knowledge she is able to research what works and what is hype.
Exercise your brain like it’s a muscle?
What exactly is brain training, and how do you do it?
The idea is to repeat specific exercises to improve some of the activities of the brain.
Memory, speed of processing information, and attention (focus) are some of the most popular aspects of brain function that are trained, using the exercises.
Most of the brain training exercises are in the form of games or puzzles. The idea is to have fun and not be bored while doing the brain exercises.
As we age it becomes harder to remember new information and also to retrieve older facts and information.
Read an instruction, and then have to go back and reread it because you can’t quite recall all the details? Can’t remember the name of that great restaurant that you ate in all the time, until it closed last year?
Learn some simple ways to increase your ability to remember things.
Stress responses in both the brain and body are important for a short lived (acute) stress, like getting away from a charging bull, but have negative impacts if the stress is long term (chronic).
One of the effects of long term stress is that it can cause damage to the part of the brain known as the hippocampus, which is one of the first areas of the brain to have detectable damage in Alzheimer’s disease. This area of the brain is involved in short term memory and spatial memory and navigation.
Chronic stress has many other major negative effects such as higher blood pressure, and weakening the immune system.
