Science Behind Mental Exercise
When mental exercise or stimulation occurs, specific actions in the brain take place as a result. Neurons (connect) with other neurons to form a network. Typically, people with more neural connections are expected to have a higher IQ than people with fewer neural connections. Furthermore, mental exercise that involves using one’s non-dominant hand develops hand-brain coordination. A recent study has also shown that the brain is very similar to a muscle. This study says that during times the brain is being stimulated, it is actually growing in size, much like a muscle grows in size with exercise. When humans learn new things, the prefrontal cortex in the brain receives exercise. Also, the prefrontal cortex is the area of the brain that is known to weaken the most as age increases. This part of the brain controls reconciling contradictory thoughts, decision-making, foreseeing future events, and regulating social control. In addition, this area of the brain is strongly linked to a person’s general intelligence and personality. Therefore, it is imperative that the prefrontal cortex receives ample exercise to allow this part of the brain to remain sharp into old age. Without receiving enough exercise, it is possible that a person’s personality will change drastically during the later stages of life.
Read more about this topic: Mental Exercise
Famous quotes containing the words science, mental and/or exercise:
“The motive of science was the extension of man, on all sides, into Nature, till his hands should touch the stars, his eyes see through the earth, his ears understand the language of beast and bird, and the sense of the wind; and, through his sympathy, heaven and earth should talk with him. But that is not our science.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“all the categories which we employ to describe conscious mental acts, such as ideas, purposes, resolutions, and so on, can be applied to ... these latent states.”
—Sigmund Freud (1856–1939)
“To exercise power costs effort and demands courage. That is why so many fail to assert rights to which they are perfectly entitled—because a right is a kind of power but they are too lazy or too cowardly to exercise it. The virtues which cloak these faults are called patience and forbearance.”
—Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900)