[ExI] Brain aging test/was Re: Fwd: FYI: Experimental Man

[Dan]

--- On Thu, 4/16/09, Mike Dougherty <msd001 at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Thu, Apr
> 16, 2009 at 12:48 PM, Dan <dan_ust at yahoo.com>
> wrote:
> --- On Thu, 4/16/09, Natasha Vita-More
> <natasha at natasha.cc> wrote:
> 
> > I took the test.
> 
> > http://www.portfolio.com/interactive-features/2008/06/Brain-Age
> 
> > Before I release my brain's age, I'll try it
> again (just to
> > make sure).
> 
> Haven't taken it yet, but I wonder how the time
> of day it's taken and other conditions influence the
> results.  I can imagine someone with a youthful brain
> taking it under really bad conditions and at the wrong time
> concluding her brain is not so youthful -- and someone with
> a not so youthful brain taking it under ideal conditions and
> concluding, in comparison with the former person, that his
> brain is in good shape (or better than hers).
> 
> Take a left-right brain test before a day of work and
> after.  In my case I went from 35/65 to 65/35 in the course
> of 9 hours.  Does that invalidate the test or
> "prove" that the brain is really so adaptive that
> it can change significantly depending on task(s) ?

I don't think it invalidates it at all.  It's about what I expected: under different conditions, brians work better or worse.  Of course, for benchmarking, I'd like to find the optimal and average conditions.  If the test is at all valid, then this could be used to gauge, over large populations, different interventions (e.g., supplements) and their impact on brain function.*
 
> Most likely the test itself is meaningless, the account
> creation is what pays the bills - every email collected is
> $$ to someone in a cross-marketing situation.
> </cynicism>

That's one reason I didn't take the test.  :)

Regards,

Dan

*  Was it here that was mentioned the report stating that people seem to peak cognitively in their mid-20s on average?  I seem to recall such a report a few weeks ago and remember one comment on it being that this is when people tend to finish college so that the cognitive decline might just be most people slow down on learning new things.  The take away being: keep learning new things intensively until your brain burns out.  :)