<p>As some of you here on CC know, I've begun an aggressive study on brain training, essentially how to substantially increase my mental acuity and cognitive performance. I want to strengthen my brain's performance in the areas of memory, visual-spatial, logic, concentration/focus, and language. After examining my self academically and intellectually, I don't believe my brain is functioning at an acceptable level of performance.</p>
<p>I've gotten so interested in this that I'm developing a proprietary brain training 'strategy' primarily for execution in my undergraduate studies. I've also tested and discovered that I'm a audio-visual learner and I will be tailoring my study habits to accommodate this learning 'style'.</p>
<p>I've purchased five books written by neurologists and experts in cognition. There are many factors such as diet, sleep, mental 'exercises', stress, physical fitness, and habits (such as smoking and drinking) that I've read information on that have a bearing on your brain's performance. I believe that newly-acquired interest of mine in brain training this will help me tremendously in my personal life, but more importantly, in my academic experience.</p>
<p>My goal? Tailor my personal learning style with superior study habits and "brain training" to transfer from El Centro College to Southern Methodist University and afterward, acquire a joint degree in law and computer science/engineering.</p>
<p>Am I wasting my time with brain training or is it very relevant to increasing academic performance? What are your thoughts?</p>
<p>Personally, I think it's a waste of time due to opportunity cost.</p>
<p>You can get smarter by doing exercises, or...</p>
<p>You can get smarter by doing your homework, which gets things done, helps your study habits, causes you to actually learn something useful, and makes you smarter.</p>
<p>Time is valuable in college, which one would you prefer?</p>
<p>Don't make it a self fulfilling prophecy- if you think you are dumb, you will be dumb. Don't keep bugging yourself that your natural intelligence is inferior, do what you love, be academically focused, and the results will follow.</p>
<p>Lollybo, thanks for replying. I think I clear up something regarding brain training.</p>
<p>Yes, the two links provided by the respondents are mental exercise programs designed to target increased cognition, but according to my personal studies, increasing your mental acuity is much more than doing some 'exercises'. If you want to increase your mental power and get your brain to function at an optimum rate of performance, there are changes you can make in your diet, physical exercise regime, outlook on life/pyschological well being, music selection, and more.</p>
<p>It's just like wanting to get physically fit. You don't exercise 24/7, but make a number of changes with your diet as well.</p>
<p>So, there really isn't an additional time cost to doing so. Yes, the things you mentioned do have a substantial bearing on academic performance, but they too are only a part of the equation.</p>
<p>I believe academic success to be indicative to how well your brain is functioning/performing and how well you actually input the information by studying.</p>
<p>I agree with you- there are many factors that influence how well you can think. For example, some people are morning people, some are not. Some people can still think with little sleep, others (like me) can not. Some people cram for tests and do fine, others cannot.</p>
<p>If biological variation affects physical features (height, weight, metabolism) I think it is safe to assume that there is biological variation in the mind as well. Part of becoming a "smart" person is knowing your body, and knowing what you can/should do to maximize your performance before exams (much like an athlete knows what to do before a sporting event).</p>
<p>That's not to say intelligence can be measured in a one-dimensional scale. For example, it's hard to say X athlete is better than Y athlete- there's multiple factors like strength, endurance, flexibility, consistency, etc that are better for different sports.</p>
<p>But it really shouldn't become an obsession to figure out how to think at peak levels. Most of it is common sense: don't pull an all nighter before an exam (unless you are one of the few people who can), don't eat a ton of sugar or else you will get a low afterwards, don't stress out before an exam, eat a lot of carbohydrates to give you energy for a hard exam/challenging assignment, etc. It's not rocket science, it's all about experience and figuring out how your own body works.</p>
<p>I'd say the research and books you're reading are definitely valuable... it's december break - might as well read them while other people are working or staying at home not studying.</p>
<p>Teach Yourself Training Your Brain, by Terry Horne and Simon Wooton
Making A Good Brain Great, by Daniel G. Amen, M.D.
Secrets of Mental Math, by Dr. Arthur Benjamin and Michael Shermer
Dental Floss For The Mind, by Michel Noir, Ph.D. and Bernard Croisile, M.D. and Ph.D.
Self-Testing Your IQ, by Dr. Jean Cirillo
How to Get A's in College, by Hundreds of Heads Books, LLC
Logic 200 Puzzles by USA Today</p>
<p>I know Dan ... meh....I DO have to give him props for being a GREAT businessman. Don't know the other authors, but it's always a good sign if the books are "peer-reviewed".</p>
<p>alot of people say solving sudoku, and cross word puzzles and other brain teasers of the like are good for your brain. I read an article that i can't remember from where, but it was a credible source, that doing those training exercises only gets you better trained for that specific task and not necessarily your overall brain function. </p>
<p>I believe a good diet exercise and constantly learning something new (relating to ur major) will keep you on top of the ball.</p>
<p>I'm Dr. Jean Cirillo, the author of " Complete Idiot's Guide to Self-Testing Your IQ " Thank you for using my book for brain training. How is it working? Keep in touch, Jean.</p>
<p>You don't increase 'language' ability directly, that is by doing exercises or artificially. I assume you mean English ability, and not foreign language ability since the ways of increasing either are very different. You said earlier you wanted to increase your vocabulary. So don't make vocab lists and study them; just read good, classic literature. It takes care of two birds with one stone and you'll be wasting less time on what some theoretical 'expert' has to say.</p>
<p>I completely understand the desire to improve your brain. The concept isn't so alien; after all, people practice sports all the time to try to improve this or that aspect of their athleticism. However, your brain is a much more complicated muscle and you are thinking that training it directly (through special 'brain exercises') will somehow be better or faster than the usual way of doing it (logic puzzles, reading books and so on).</p>
<p>What I'm concerned about with you (but of course, you won't listen because in these situations people have a tendency not to) is that you'll see something you want, work at it intensely for weeks even months with shoddy methods gotten out of books, and then quit short of your goal. It's like someone who watches the Snowboarding Championships saying "I want to do that!" so they go out and buy books and mentally prepare themselves and finally go to the ski slopes to putz around but never actually get any better.</p>
<p>(Oh, and please don't labor under the illusion that you need to be smart to be good at school. I've met plenty of people who had higher GPAs than 'geniuses' and it's for the simple reason that school is a game and the name of that game isn't intelligence. Study</a> Hacks Blog Archive Q & A: How Much Does Intelligence Matter at College?)</p>
<p>^I want to clarify some things about this thread and your last post:</p>
<p>First of all, I'm using "brain training" techniques to increase cognitive performance, but make myself "more intelligent." Essentially, my efforts are to enhance my brain so that learning can be executed quicker, more efficiently, and increase mental "endurance." Brain training is not about increasing one's intelligence, but "prepping" the brain to facilitate higher intelligence, by higher learning.</p>
<p>Much research has been done to substantiate that special brain training "games" do enhance several cognitive functions such as concentration, logic, visual/spatial skills, and mathematical reasoning. More traditional efforts such as logic puzzles and reading books are successful as well.</p>
<p>I'm equally concerned that you seem to dismiss my efforts at researching brain training techniques from various books without actually actually reading them yourself. There's a mountain of research on this, and dismissing it all isn't a very reasonable approach, don't you think?</p>
<p>I do appreciate the link you provided. Although it's not very relevant to the thread, it's a good read for those of us who seem to be contending with such an issue of higher intelligence equals better academic performance.</p>
<p>Where in my post did I ever say that I never read any of these books myself? I have, in fact, and I didn't enjoy them or even find them to be tangentially useful at all. You seem to take on a very defensive tone in all your posts. I am not attacking you or your goals, merely the methods through which you choose to accomplish them. If you believe so strongly in your method that you defend it from every possible angle then this is a debate, not a question.</p>
<p>^I said you seemed to dismiss my efforts without...reading them, as in you allegedly haven't read them. But I still highly doubt that you read the books as there isn't a shred of evidence to indicate that you did.</p>
<p>I do welcome your thoughts on raising one's mental acuity/increasing cognitive performance, if you happen to know methods/strategies that are allegedly "better" or superior to those that are mentioned in my scientifically and medically-substantiated publications.</p>