Combine Techniques to Double Brain Boost

In the Next Brain blog we review techniques that hold good promise for improving brain function and cognitive performance.  Many of the techniques involve lifestyle choices, for example how you eat, sleep, interact with others and exercise; others involve major development efforts such as  learning to play a musical instrument, second language or how to reason critically; still others are specialized, for example neuro-feedback, brain training, mindfulness and yoga.   One concern I often hear is that many techniques produce small or temporary effects.  This is true. One way to combat that is to combine them for greater effect.

For example, researchers at Ohio State University studied the impact of combing aerobic exercise and music, two well-known brain boosters, to find:

“The improvement in verbal fluency test performance after listening to music was more than double that of the non-music condition.”

Listening to music while you workout will significantly improve your score on a standardized cognitive test.  Subjects in the study that listened to the music also reported feeling better and a more positive mood.

I am looking for additional research on combination effects. If you have a reference or personal story you would like to share please reply to this blog post.