Wouldn’t it be cool if you could just pop a pill and become smarter? After all, smart is the new sexy. While a pill that improves cognition is yet to be created, here are a few simple hacks, easy as ever, to increase your cognition!
1. Start your day by drinking a tall glass of water
Studies have shown that children who drink water at the start of a task, perform better than others. It is perfect to start your day with water, since you have denied your body of water the whole night. The studies also indicate that even under conditions of mild dehydration, not caused by exercise, intentional water deprivation or heat exposure, children’s cognitive performance can be improved with a drink of water.
2. Drink green tea during the day
Instead of drinking coffee, switch to green tea. A new study found that green tea extract increases the brain’s effective connectivity. This leads to an improvement in actual cognitive performance: Subjects tested significantly better for working memory tasks after the admission of green tea extract.
3. Take a short nap during the day
A perfectly timed nap does wonders when you are tired. But the important point to note here is that the nap must not exceed 15 – 20 minutes and must be taken between 1 pm and 3 pm.
4. Play a video game instead of watching TV in your free time
So you have some time for yourself. Instead of microwaving the popcorn, grabbing a beer and settling on the couch to watch TV, just plonk on your bed and play video games. Video game training augments GM (Gray matter) in brain areas crucial for spatial navigation, strategic planning, working memory and motor performance going along with evidence for behavioral changes of navigation strategy. The presented video game training could therefore be used to counteract known risk factors for mental disease like post-traumatic stress disorder, schizophrenia and neurodegenerative disease. We can bet this is the coolest bit of news you’ve heard all day!
5. Get some exercise
Research shows that exercise, the aerobic kind, increases the size of your hippocampus. So the kind of exercise that gets your heart racing, increases function in the region of the brain that is responsible for verbal learning and memory. So go ahead, take a jog around the block, and swim in the society pool or jump rope your way to smartness!
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