HumanOS.me

Videogames have been, in my view, unfairly maligned for decades, and recent neuroscience is slowly exonerating them.

For instance, a large study of more than 2200 children found that kids who reported playing videogames for more than 3 hours per day performed better on cognitive skill tests involving impulse control and working memory, compared to non-gamers. But even more impressively, playing videogames has been shown to have a lasting beneficial impact on cognition. Adults who were avid gamers in childhood were found to perform better in cognitive tests, despite not having played the games in years.

Now, there are a few reasons why this might be the case. Videogames involve problem-solving, working memory, motor skills, and (in some cases) teamwork. Interestingly, some researchers have suggested that videogames may also be functioning as a form of environmental enrichment for humans.

We've known for a long time that enriching the environment of laboratory animals with novel sights, sounds, smells, etc, to provoke sensory stimulation, engages their brain. This has been shown to enhance memory and neuroplasticity as well as shield the brain from age-related cognitive decline. (This is why zoos frequently introduce strange objects to their animals' otherwise static habitats.)

But of course, videogames vary tremendously in their capacity to stimulate our senses. If you've played games that were released within the past few years, you've probably noticed that the graphics are a major upgrade from games that you might have played when you were little. Modern 3-dimensional videogames are able to immerse players in a rich world, full of cool things to explore, and unique sights and sounds that are both highly realistic and hard to find in normal daily life. Think about, say, Tetris versus Call of Duty. Totally different experience, right?

So this raises a couple of questions. Can virtual environmental enrichment, through videogames, trigger improvements in cognition similar to what is seen in the animal literature? And accordingly, do more visually stimulating games, presenting the user with complex environments, have a greater impact on brainpower?

Check out the newsletter to learn more: https://mailchi.mp/humanos.me/newsletter-256

Depression is estimated to affect a staggering 300 million people around the world, costing the global economy as much as $1 trillion in lost productivity every year. Unfortunately, it is a difficult problem to solve. A tremendous portion of people battling depression are treatment-resistant, likely because it is a complex, multifactorial disease process.

Observational evidence, as well as some intervention studies, have suggested that a healthy diet, and particularly higher intake of foods rich in dietary fiber, may decrease risk of depression. However, there hasn't been very much research that directly examines how dietary fiber might interact with mental health outcomes…until quite recently. I stumbled upon a few new-ish studies that not only show a link between higher fiber intake and lower risk of depression, but also suggest that fiber (as well as some other health-promoting dietary components) may exert this effect by dampening inflammation, which I thought was worth diving into.

https://mailchi.mp/humanos.me/newsletter-250