Brilliant Blog

The CDC has reported a joint initiative with the Alzheimer’s Association to create the Healthy Brain Initiative: A National Public Health Roadmap for Cognitive Health. Some quotes from their announcement: "In order to maintain and improve the cognitive performance of all adults, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the Alzheimer's Association today released the [...]

A new version of emWave® PC Stress Relief System (formerly Freeze-Framer) has been released with a new name, new games, new features, new interactive coach, and all new content.New features and enhancements include: Categorized content sections with over 100 pages of reference information including Health and Well-Being, Health Professional, Sports Performance, Workplace Performance, and Testing and Learning.The Coherence Coach™ teaches stress reduction and trains you to find "The Zone".Emotion Visualizer™ displays colorful images which change as you change your emotional state.

Straight Choices

The Psychology of Decision Making

• By Benjamin R. Newell, David A. Lagnado, David R. Shanks

We all face a perplexing array of decisions every day. Straight Choices provides an integrative account of the psychology of decision making, in which clear connections are made between empirical results and how these results can help us to understand our uncertain world.

Throughout the text, there is an emphasis on the relationship between learning and decision making. The authors argue that the best way to understand how and why decisions are made is in the context of the learning and knowledge acquisition that precedes them and the feedback that follows them. The mechanisms of learning and the structure of environments in which decisions are made are carefully examined to explore the ways in which they act on our choices. From this, the authors go on to consider whether we are all constrained to fall prey to biases or whether with sufficient exposure can we find optimal decision strategies and improve our decision making.

This novel approach integrates findings from the decision and learning literatures to provide a unique perspective on the psychology of decision making. It will be of interest to researchers and students in cognitive psychology, as well as researchers in economics and philosophy interested in the nature of decision making.

ISBN: 9781841695884

Published June 14 2007 by Psychology Press.

A fun article from the BBC highlights some of the latest entries to the 2.5 billion-word database of words in the Collins English Dictionary, 9th edition.We were of course biased and happy to see "brainfood" as a newly minted word. According to Webster's New Millennium™ Dictionary of English, they define "brain food"...any food that is considered to aid intelligence, memory, or creativity; by extension, any intellectual sustenance.We'd like to add SharpBrains to the list of brain foods!

We all know chronic stress is bad for our heart, our weight, and our mood, but how about our memory?Interestingly, acute stress can help you focus and remember things more vividly.Chronic stress, on the other hand, reduces your ability to focus and can specifically damage cells in the hippocampus, a brain structure critical to encoding short term memory.When is stress chronic? When you feel out of control of your life. You may feel irritable or anxious. While every individual varies in their response the type and quantity of stress, there are some things you can do to feel more in control of your environment. This sense of empowerment can lower your stress, and as a result, help your memory.

Here is some recommended reading among the recent carnivals:The Personal Development CarnivalCarnival of Creative GrowthCarnival of Depression, Bipolar Disorder, and Mental Health JourneysBrain BloggingCarnival of MathematicsCarnival of Leadership GrowthCarnival of HealingSuccess Stories, Doing What they LoveDoing it Differently Blog CarnivalEnjoy!

Here is new brain teaser from puzzle master Wes Carroll.He found this one in the Mensa publication Number Puzzles for Math Geniuses by Harold Gale.Question:Start at the corner number and collect another four numbers by following the paths shown.Add the five numbers together.What is the lowest number you can score?Click to read the Solution and Explanation

Dr. David Rabiner's Attention Research Update drew my attention to a recent spate of research articles on the potential of omega-3 fatty acid dietary supplementation to help treat ADD/ADHD. Stimulant medication for children with ADD/ADHD has been the predominant treatment for years. Thus far, it has been quite successful, but we have yet to see the long term effects of chronic medication. Given that, it is worth at least investigating alternative therapies that can be used either in place of or in conjunction with traditional pharmaceutical and behavioral treatment. As one of the four pillars of brain health, nutrition has a significant impact on both physical structures in the body and behavior. Nutritional research though is often difficult to conduct. It is unethical to withhold essential nutrients from people and nutrients work synergistically, which makes it difficult to discern the effect of one nutrient versus another.