Scientists at UC San Francisco are reporting that they have found a way to reverse some of the negative effects of aging on the brain, using a video game designed to improve cognitive¹ control. The findings, published on Sept. 5 in Nature, show that a specially² designed 3-D video game can improve cognitive performance in healthy older adults, they said. The researchers said the study provides a measure of scientific support to the burgeoning³（增长迅速的） field of brain fitness, which has been criticized for lacking evidence that such training can induce lasting⁴ and meaningful changes.

 

In the game, which was developed by the UCSF researchers, participants race a car around a winding⁵ track while a variety of road signs pop up. Drivers are instructed to keep an eye out for a specific type of sign, while ignoring all the rest, and to press a button whenever that particular sign appears. The need to switch rapidly from driving to responding to the signs -- i.e. multitasking -- generates interference in the brain that undermines performance. The researchers found that this interference increases dramatically across the adult lifespan.

 

But after receiving just 12 hours of training on the game, spread over a month, the 60- to 85-year-old study participants improved their performance until it surpassed that of 20-somethings who played the game for the first time.

 

The training also improved the participants' performance in two other important cognitive areas: working memory and sustained attention. And participants maintained their skills at the video game six months after the training had ended.

 

"The finding is a powerful example of how plastic the older brain is," said Adam Gazzaley, MD, PhD, UCSF associate professor of neurology, physiology⁶ and psychiatry⁷ and director of the Neuroscience Imaging Center. Gazzaley co-founded the company, Akili Interactive⁸ Labs, which is developing the next generation of the video game.

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